


Reclaim What's Yours

by AyYouFiction



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-31
Updated: 2016-06-27
Packaged: 2018-01-10 18:08:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 28
Words: 33,004
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1162871
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AyYouFiction/pseuds/AyYouFiction
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The wars for the Iron Throne are done, but what can help Gendry move beyond his scars and look to his future?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A Bargain Struck

**Author's Note:**

> I own nothing of the original A Song of Ice and Fire Series content nor the original Game of Thrones content. Everything else is mine.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did you once enjoy reading this fic or have you started reading it and wish the whole story was available? Well, because someone has stolen my work (as well as the work of many others) to post on their site, I have removed all instances of the full version of this story, everywhere. This person has made steps to evade law and ignore the few rights we fanfic authors have in the name of "preserving" the fics they stole. Guess what? I'm not sure they're aware of it or not, but they have a limited version. The full version of this fic is now no longer available because of them. Wish you could read the whole thing? I wish that, too. Thank them for all of this (nadie4ever.go@gmail.com).

This is a _heavily_ and _terribly_ edited version. I'm sorry if you came here with the honest intention of reading and not taking, but a thieving ass shat in the well and ruined it for all.

* * *

There were times when Gendry wondered what would become of his life, but this was not one of those times.

Staring at the bottom of his second cup of ale, his biggest worry was whether or not to have it refilled while he barely listened to the prattling of his friend across the table from him.

"…and so when I hear'm, I grab my boots and jump out the window—," Thonas interrupted his own joke as his eyes squeezed shut, and he thumped his cup on the table, amused by his words so much that he couldn't even force out the sound. After a cough and full breath, he continued, "By the time her man got to the room, I was already down the road, in the brothel!"

Now doubled over, one hand pressed to his knee for balance while the other held his stomach, Thonas laughed until tears worked their way out of his eyes.

Perhaps the joke would have been funny if shared with someone else, but Gendry couldn't allow himself to think of what men and women do with their bodies.

"Seven Hells, you're a sad sight," Thonas proclaimed as he rested his chin on his hand, his elbow teetering precariously on the table.

Thonas was loud, and Thonas was often obnoxious, but Thonas was also what Gendry could truly call a friend. The truth of it was that he hadn't had one of those since…

"You know what you need?" Thonas's firm, loud voice and his free hand slapping down flat to the table was enough to cut the thought from his mind.

"You need a thorough bedding."

Gendry rolled his eyes. How could he manage doing it?

The man pushed himself from the table and leaned back on his bench as he raised his arms up and wide. "How about that one?"

The woman's red hair, even though it was nothing like the sleek red of Melissandre's, made Gendry wince as his balls cowered nearer his stomach.

"Alright then." Thonas seemed to read an expression on Gendry's face that Gendry wasn't even aware he'd had. Could this be one of his half-siblings? Another that somehow survived the Westeros-wide massacre?

"Hmm," Thonas rubbed his stubbly chin as though coming to the same conclusion at the same time. How about her?"

The woman turned her head in their direction and appraised them both.

Gendry's head turned away quickly, his eyes looking in all directions other than hers. Was he truly considering this?

Thonas dropped back into his previous position: his head perched on his hand, his elbow balancing on the table with a drunken wobble.

"That one?" Thonas lazily pointed to a brown haired girl, could barely be considered a woman grown.

Gendry felt badly for his friend, he truly did.

Barely interested in his own endeavor, now, Thonas once more pointed to another woman in the inn.

"Ah hah!" Thonas sat up and thumped his fist on the table, causing Gendry to jump.

She made her way over to their table with a pitcher and glanced from Thonas to Gendry and back with a friendly smile. "Need more ale?"

"Aye," Thonas answered."

One eyebrow rose higher than the other before she began filling their cups."

Gendry felt heat shoot throughout his entire body, and his palms began to sweat.

In the blink of an eye, heat rushed to his face and his cock, although far more to the latter.

"Your speech, you're not from around here." Thonas didn't say it directly, but the question was there.

"No," she said and slammed the pitcher on the table, ale sloshing over the sides."

And she had every right to be defensive.

"Hmm." Thonas sounded so content as he leaned toward the woman from his bench."

The anger and resentment in her eyes vanished, and in its place was something else Gendry couldn't quite place."

There was definitely some hesitation as she slid onto the bench beside Thonas, but when her eyes glanced in her employer's direction once more, Newford eyed her and answered her questioning stare with a nod of approval."

Kasil licked her lips that had gone dry from her nervousness, and Gendry felt his cock pulse to life.

"It's not a story that would even interest a child."

"You hear that, Friend?" Thonas leaned back and rubbed the woman's arm in what was meant to be soothing circles, but she recoiled from his touch. Whatever can she do for it?"

Gendry's brows raised at that.

"Well, Friend here has a need and has coin. I say a bargain can be struck!"

The woman's gaze rested in Gendry's direction for confirmation, something he was only vaguely aware of since he could barely look at either of them for very different reasons. The last time he'd been humiliated with witnesses was when the red witch…

"What say you, Friend?" Thonas was also unrelenting.

There was a heartbeat when Gendry's temper almost caused him to tell his "friend" to slowly wander blind-folded through the seven hells, but a hand, calloused by hard word and a hard life, covered his.

In his own body, his heart beat inside his chest like the drums the nobles used for their not-so-noble celebrations.

"I'm willing if you are, Friend," she said to him, her voice soft and barely heard.

What he could hear was the whooping of his so called friend and what sounded like "thorough bedding."


	2. The Defining Moment

This is a _heavily_ and _terribly_ edited version. I'm sorry if you came here with the honest intention of reading and not taking, but a thieving ass shat in the well and ruined it for all.  
  
The floorboard creaked as Gendry shifted his weight.  
  
She'd walked past him, smelling of the sour, earthy ale she'd been serving, and he followed her while facing the door as he closed it behind them.  
  
Behind him, he heard the floor creak softly under her and the rustling of her dress along it."  
  
Gendry's head snapped in her direction, dumbfounded by what he'd just heard.  
  
There was something lodged in his throat, or at least it felt that way. He hadn't been this ready for a woman since…  
  
Gendry shook his head clear, and then once again made eye contact with the woman that offered herself to him freely.  
  
When her shift was nothing more than a pile of roughspun on the floorboards and her body was bare to him, for him, he realized that he could do this; he could lay with her.  
  
Before he could convince himself otherwise, Gendry crossed the room and trapped her face in his hands.  
  
With a whimper, her body weakened in his arms and her soft, warm lips parted for his tongue to enter.  
  
As much as it pained him to relinquish her mouth, he gently pulled away from her just long enough to strip down to nothing faster than he'd ever remember doing in his life.  
  
But this was his salvation, this was his moment to reclaim his mind and body from the red witch, and before either one of them could allow their fears to destroy this moment, Gendry pulled her naked body to his and dipped down to resume the kiss he was so reluctant to withdraw from in the first place.  
  
If there was doubt blooming within her, it withered and died quickly as she sighed into his kiss and yielded her body to his, her arms slipping around his neck for support.  
  
Kasil shifted her weight to the balls of her feet, stretching herself to come closer to his height, and Gendry helped her by reaching for her thighs and lifted her.  
  
With her wrapped around him, her mouth firmly on his, their tongues dancing and dueling alternately, he tentatively knelt on the bed and felt the straw stuffing gather and crunch under his knee.  
  
Gendry leaned forward, Kasil holding on to him until her back reached the bed then released him from her embrace.  
  
It was too much to think beyond his need to collapse on top of her.  
  
He would give Kasil enjoyment this night if it killed him, and if this was only the first of more tries, it just might do that.


	3. I Should Have Known

This is a _heavily_ and _terribly_ edited version. I'm sorry if you came here with the honest intention of reading and not taking, but a thieving ass shat in the well and ruined it for all.

These sounds had always been nothing more than background noise for his numb mind, but this day was different.

He wanted to get up and join the world without having to be prodded from his bed by Thonas.

Thonas had told him the scent of a woman was intoxicating, and Gendry finally understood what he meant.

There were no more thoughts of the red witch, and Gendry felt the weight of mistrust and anger at the world melt away until there was nothing left except the here and now.

Kasil was his savior, and suddenly, he wanted to see her and remind himself that last night did indeed happen, that he truly was capable of being with a woman, he really was free.

Daybreak was when serving girls started their day, after all.

The woman gave him something he never thought he could get back, and he silently wished her well on her journey home to her mother.

Thonas said all he needed was to fuck the red witch out of his head, and that was what he did…and then some.

Arya.

If he'd only truly listened to her, that her words were not that of a spoiled little lady with misguided dreams of how grand the lives of smallfolk were, perhaps he could have teased out the truth of it all.

She just wanted him to be her family.

He'd abandoned her, afraid that she would abandon him for her noble family, and that was his greatest shame, the reason why he couldn't face his memories of her.

She gave him back Arya.

The one that radiated trust and true friendship from every pore, traits Gendry didn't fully appreciate at the time.

That would be his way to honor their friendship, to honor what she'd given freely and what he refused so readily.

Thonas would have to understand that this must be done, that he would leave on the morrow.

Gendry lifted himself from the bed, rested comfortably back on his elbows and took in the room that seemed bright and new overnight.

And he had a task to carry out, for his friend.

Making his way to the table, he rubbed his face in his hands trying to wake himself fully.

As dry as he felt, he was going to need three pitchers of water to replenish what he'd sweated the night before.

It wasn't freshly baked, but it was still thoughtful to leave something for him to eat.

There was something familiar about it, something he should remember.

This was Arya's sword; this was her pride and her soul given to her by a beloved family member.

Gendry's head snapped to the door of his room, the door Kasil had walked through before leaving these things for him, and a cold realization began at the nape of his neck and shivered down his spine until finally ending at his toes.

He wasn't going to waste time dressing fully.

The docks in the back of the inn were filled with fishermen going about their daily business, ignoring the woman standing on the edge with her arms folded and her eyes intensely focused on a ship quickly reaching the horizon.

Mornings in King's Landing were only chilly now that winter was waning, chilly nights and mild daytime weather was the extent of the effect late winter had on this region.

They focused on him, awaiting his next move.

Her jaw was more pronounced and the roundness of childhood all but lost.

As far as he knew, Arya was dead and his memories of her were consciously suppressed, so he didn't look for her in the faces of the woman passing through his life.

He wanted to be able to trust someone again the way he trusted her.

Her name overheard by the wrong ears was just as dangerous as his.


	4. Change of Plans

The light frost of dawn started to seep in further than skin deep and caused her to shiver before Gendry offered the warmth of his body and blanket. Arya believed the chill had something more to do with the emotions churning inside her than the actual weather.

They'd exchanged names, their true names, and suddenly she felt more exposed than when he was on top of her and inside her. She hadn't heard her name spoken on someone's lips for what seemed like eternity, but this was what she'd intended when she left Needle on the his table, hadn't she?

Honestly, she didn't know what she intended. She'd had other plans for the morning: hop aboard the earliest ship bound for Braavos, the ship now hugging the horizon. But that didn't work out. None of her plans worked out.

"Why me?" he asked her, his voice so soft and fragile it tore at her heart, a thing she'd imagined for so long had shriveled and hardened into stone. It hurt even more that she couldn't answer that directly; the truth made her nervous. He'd asked this simple question before, just after she forced him to take her maidenhead. Why him? She'd met other good men during her travels. Why did it have to be Gendry?

"And why did you lie to me?" That question offended her.

"I didn't lie to you," she told him with a steady tone that took some effort to maintain. "I wouldn't lie to you."

"You did lie to me!" he spat as he removed his arm from around her shoulders, although, the blanket stayed in place around her. His anger bubbled to the surface, barely contained in a strangled whisper that wanted so much to be a shout. There was that quick temper of her beloved friend she remembered. "You were supposed to be dead. You said your name was Kasil…your ill mother…but you're highborn…I took your…" He covered his face with his hands as the half thoughts finally wound down into one defeated statement: "Oh, Seven Hells."


	5. Pack, Family, Future

"As _my_ lady commands."

Once, five or a thousand years ago, those words would have been meant to provoke her. Not that it took much, then. It was the time when Gendry would have chosen to surround himself with strangers rather than accept her as a lady over him.

This time, there was an acceptance of the title, respect and seriousness for what it meant for them both. He understood that when she decided to embrace him, she was embracing all that she was: Arya of House Stark, Lady or Princess of Winterfell, depending on who you were to ask in Westeros.

It was the way his voice deepened at the word "my," however, that hinted of something more, of a possessiveness that she wasn't sure how to interpret or how it made her feel. All she knew was that it made her body warmer beside him.

Their tongues lay silent during their walk back to the inn, but she couldn't help but glance in his direction every other heartbeat just to assure herself that he wouldn't vanish like he did in her dreams.

_She would come upon a smithy, always at night, always with a warm glow of the fires from the open doorway. When she reached the door, she watched him hammer the steel with the deafening clank. His back to her, bare except for the straps of his leather smithy apron tied at his neck and waist, she could see his shoulder muscles strain and roll under the weight of the metal. Her eyes followed the lines of his ribs, down to the narrower waist and hips barely covered by his breeches, and she felt the flutter in her stomach._

_In her dream, there was no need to ignore and make excuses for it. She wanted to touch him, to feel those muscles work under her fingertips. But when she reached for him, when her fingers were but a hair's breadth from his skin, he vanished. Looking around for him, the fires were dead and cold and in the place where Gendry stood was his old bull helm, mangled and misshapen._

The nights when she couldn't sleep, she lay awake and imagined his last breaths, imagined how he met his death after the red woman took him, believing she was somehow connected with the Gold Cloaks. In Arya's mind, it was always without anyone to mourn him, without anyone to care that the bull-headed boy named Gendry passed from this world.


	6. Are You Friend or Foe?

A creaking floorboard somewhere in the room roused Gendry awake, but not enough that he wanted to open his eyes. The fog of sleep still thick in his mind, all he wanted, all he could think to want, was to feel Arya's warm body close to his. His arm reached for the other side of the bed but found nothing but the cold bedding.

Then there was the gritty sound of a shoe sliding over the floor and something low and muffled across the room. "Arya?" he mumbled and lifted his head slightly. It took far more effort than any other time; the weight of it seemingly doubled. During their shared night and morn, Arya pushed him to his physical limits as though she were making up for time lost or trying to load everything into a short future. Whichever it was, it drained him.

He heard the muffled sound again. "Arya?" He tried to use more force in his voice this time as he lifted his torso fully from the bed only to flop over onto his back. Willing his eyes to open, he stared at the graying ceiling-boards for a heartbeat before gathering enough strength to sit upright. There were nothing but shadows—his east-facing room had so little light later in the day—but it was the large shadow close to the door that grabbed his attention. It was too large to be Arya, though.

As it came into focus, Gendry could make out Thonas's form standing at an awkward angle, and there were legs wrapped around his hips, a hand clawed around his throat while an arm wrapped around his sword arm. The form around him shifted in a very fluid motion, every so often readjusting for the most effective position. Gendry had once seen this before while watching a snake squeeze the life out of a field mouse. At the moment, Thonas looked very much like that field mouse.

The muffled sound was Thonas trying to call his name as Arya choked the life out of him with her hand, her body squeezing him further. She was stronger than she looked; Gendry could attest to that.

"Arya, what are you doing?"


	7. On the Goldroad

The sun dipped below the treeline marking the end of a day's travel on horseback. Gendry's rump was sore, and the constant movement of his horse was starting to wear on his groin. For yet another time, he gave himself a small respite by shifting his weight from the seat of the saddle to his stirrups, but what he looked forward to, what he considered the best part of their travels, was making camp and being free of the beast if only for the night.

At his one side, Thonas seemed a little more at ease than him, but only a little. The man's constant shifting atop his saddle was the only evidence of some discomfort, though. At his other side, Arya showed no sign of tiring. In fact, she seemed more at ease from the moment she climbed onto her rounsey.

King's Landing was a fortnight in their rear, and they would reach Lannisport by the next evening at their pace. At least they no longer spent their nights with Arya and Thonas glaring at one another at the fire as though sizing an enemy.

"It's time to make camp," she said as she stopped her horse and dismounted with one hop. Gendry felt as though someone had lifted a weight from his shoulders at her words. He would be on firm ground for a few hours and fill his belly with something other than water and those leathery sticks of salted meats, not to mention other things to look forward to during their camp.

Thonas immediately swung one leg over and slid down the side of his horse whereas Gendry was so sore and his limbs so stiff, he removed himself from the beast with care. The chestnut rounsey snorted, obviously as relieved to be rid of him as Gendry was to be of it.

As they led their horses off the road and over steep hills of stones and rock, no one said a word, but Gendry could feel the excitement from Arya like waves of heat. Her sister, the last of her family, was little more than a day's ride away. He envied her in that she had some piece, some reminder, of her life before.


	8. A Good Sister

Lannisport wasn't as large as King's Landing, but it was just as bustling when they arrived before the sun dipped completely below the horizon of the Sunset Sea. With so many bodies milling about, there was no room to ride their horses, requiring them to find the nearest stable.

Thonas volunteered quickly to find and stable their beasts, but Gendry had the feeling the man's eagerness to be so helpful had more to do with him reaching his limit for their company. He couldn't blame him; the jug of ale could only bring so much comfort in the night.

With that taken care of, Gendry's next order of business was to secure them a couple of rooms in one of the inns. He didn't want Arya's sister's first sight of her to be dark circles about her eyes and her body and clothes covered in road filth. Barely able to admit it to himself, a sliver of him hoped that presenting a healthy, well cared for Arya to her sister would impress the woman and garner favor. Favor for what, he had no idea. Of all the tales Arya told of her sister, the Lady Sansa didn't seem the type to condone what was between them under any circumstance.

The inn they chose was small and didn't look like much, but it seemed clean and offered tubs for bathing, which were what both of them wanted badly. The innkeeper gave them a wary eye until Arya threw him four dragons without hesitation, pulled from a purse obviously filled with more. It was no wonder the man fell all over himself to shuffle his wife out from the back rooms and told her to provide them with a hot meal and ale.

The wife less enthusiastically sat them at a table with enough seating for three or more people, and dropped two steaming plates of roast pigeon and boiled potatoes in front of them, which hit the spot after four and ten days of travel food. By the time Thonas had returned to them, Gendry's bird was but bones, picked clean.

It took a moment to realize Thonas hadn't sat with them, but stood tense as though there was something he had to say but couldn't. "Thonas? What is it?" Gendry asked, and Arya's focus shifted up to the man's face.

"I heard from the stable master that the city's in mourning."

Gendry looked around and noticed a distinct lack of boisterousness, something he'd assumed was simply the way of the city. "What are they mourning?"

Thonas shifted his weight from one foot to the other and eyed Arya for an instant, but couldn't look at her for more than a heartbeat. "Seems the Lady Lannister died in the night…" he trailed off as he noticed Arya's eyes widen and her posture stiffen. "…birthing a babe."

Arya's chest heaved as though she couldn't take in enough air, and she whispered to herself, "Sansa. No."


	9. A Good Brother

Arya sat by the side of her sister's body, leaned over and whispering secrets in the ear that could no longer hear. Gendry watched her from one of the seats near the foot of the platform stairs and wondered which secrets she shared.

It was a long while before Arya was done, and when they exited the sept, there were two servants waiting for them outside of the door. The bold one in a roughspun dress all but accosted Gendry, stepping in his way so that he couldn't continue to walking with Arya. "I'm to show you to your room," she said to him in a very commanding voice. Gendry took a moment to look at the other servant, her head bowed low and her hands clasped in front of her dress made of much finer material. That woman was undoubtedly a lady's maid and sent for Arya.

Ignoring the more aggressive servant, he turned his full attention to Arya and stood close to her, his body bending to her height and his lips but a hair's breadth from her ear. "Go with her and get some sleep. I'm here whenever you need me."

Her eyes were wide and dull, the light that was Arya had been dimmed, and she stared at everything around her as though uncomprehending, but after his words, she turned toward the woman waiting for her and followed down a hall with more fine tapestries and paintings.

The aggressive woman led him down a hall that was bare stone and barely lit, most likely servants' passage. The end of their walk was the door to a room very much like the room he'd had at the inn in Flea Bottom: small, sparsely decorated, and the apparent lumps in the sheets left no question that the bed was stuffed with straw rather than feathers. Too large to be servants' quarters, more than likely, it was for unimportant guests, but guests nonetheless. He took some comfort that Arya would have a better room, one befitting a lady and relative of Lord Lannister. He envisioned her room to be large with a canopied featherbed and decorations of golden haired heroes and maidens much like the decorations surrounding the body of the Lady Lannister.


	10. More At Stake

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A big thanks to everyone who commented, kudo'd, and/or bookmarked this story.

The Lord Lannister and Arya hadn't return after the breaking of their fast, and Gendry wondered if he and Thonas were expected to sit at the table until their return. It should have been a relief when one of the lord's servants came to them with an offer from the lord himself to make use of the practice grounds, but Gendry would have been more at ease if he and Arya had returned.

The look on her face before she left the Great Hall with the lord bothered him, haunted him. He thanked the servant, but declined the offer, preferring to stay until Arya's return. Thonas suddenly appeared beside him with a smack to the back that took the air out of his chest. "What my friend here wants to say is that we to accept the offer."

The servant, a very slight, golden-haired man whose gaze never seemed to lift from his shoes, waited to lead them to their destination. Gendry continued to try and catch his breath, and Thonas grinned contently as he whispered, "Practice is exactly what you need, rather than pining for the Lady Assassin."

Gendry let out an exasperated breath, ready to argue that he wasn't pining, but when the servant and Thonas walked ahead, Gendry hesitated and wondered if he should stay behind to wait for Arya. The thought was proof enough that Thonas was right; he was pining. Defeated, he followed behind the two men. His friend could be right in another regard: practice might be the very thing he needed.

The practice grounds were more than Gendry could have imagined. The entire area was fenced in, divided into four spaces. Each section was large enough that it could be mistaken for a horsepen and a far cry from their sword practice in the Kingswood. From what he could see, each was equipped for a different level of skill.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Fanfic authors live on caffeine and comment. Please help feed a fanfic author today!_


	11. The Lady Arya Stark

This is a _heavily_ and _terribly_ edited version. I'm sorry if you came here with the honest intention of reading and not taking, but a thieving ass shat in the well and ruined it for all.

After the first few matches with Thonas, his encounter with Arya, and more practice with the wooden warhammer, Gendry's mind and body were weary.  
  
He replayed the events with Arya in his mind and cursed himself for allowing his anger to get the better of him, again.  
  
But it was the way she looked at him with the murderous fire in her eyes that haunted him for the rest of the day.  
  
He wanted so badly for her to be in his arms again and pretend she could be his a little longer, that what he saw in her eyes was only a misunderstanding.  
  
The full moon had neared its apex, before he entered the limbo between awake and asleep, when he got his wish.  
  
There was the rustling sound of cloth pooling on the floor before the bedding shifted beside him, and the warm body of Arya cuddled close, molding itself to the side of his body.  
  
This was when he first noticed the shape of her lips were wrong.  
  
He pushed the woman away from him with a little too much force than he intended and heard a yelp and a thump on the floor.  
  
The woman righted herself from the floor and pulled the blanket from the bed to cover herself.  
  
"Who are you?" Gendry asked, and the woman scrambled to gather the clothes she must have discarded when she came into his room all the while trying to keep herself covered by the blanket.  
  
"I work in the kitchens, m'lord."  
  
Gendry rounded the edge of the bed to stand next to the woman and pressed his hand to her back, taking great pains to calm his irritation and be gentle with her, to guide her toward his door once she had her gown tied."  
  
"Ser?"  
  
"Nor a knight."  
  
"But you're a guest of the Lord Lannister," she gestured her hand around his room.  
  
"You must have some position," she questioned even as he walked her to the door.  
  
"Nothing," he said to her simply.  
  
"That's okay," she smiled warmly from the threshold of his door."  
  
Gendry seized the woman's wrist and pushed it away from him."  
  
She seemed very disappointed at first, then the corners of her lips tilted upward into a small smile before she turned and left.  
  
He couldn't tell what bothered him most: that the woman wasn't Arya, that Arya hadn't come to see him, or that he had no interest in any other woman in his bed other than Arya.  
  
Before the cock's crow of dawn, his door creaked again.  
  
His anger, like molten metal, reshaped quickly to hope and excitement when he heard the familiar voice, the voice he desperately wanted to hear all night. "Gendry?"  
  
He bolted upright and stared at the woman standing with her back to his closed door.  
  
And she did. "Are you done with your thinking?"  
  
She held him closer, her arms tight around his waist and her head pressed tightly to his chest.  
  
Arya sighed.  
  
"Don't what? What's changed, Arya?" he asked, this time pleading for her to share whatever it was the Lord Lannister burdened her with.  
  
"My sister always spoke of love," she changed the subject quickly. "Is this love?"  
  
His breath raced ahead of him, and he could barely catch up to it.  
  
"I don't know," he sighed."  
  
His jaw clenched at the thought of what he barely had and felt Arya shifting in his arms before finishing his thoughts."  
  
She slid her hand into his and twined their fingers together as she looked at them and beyond them, lost in her thoughts.  
  
"But you wanted time to mourn—"  
  
"I have too much to do," she said to him then corrected, "we have too much to do."  
  
Gendry nodded.  
  
A heavy knock at his door startled him from his sleep.  
  
Had she even come to him, or was it a dream?  
  
The door opened, and Thonas strode into his room, his chambermaid standing at the door with the key in hand."  
  
Gendry could barely follow what the man was saying, sleep addled and full of bitterness that Arya might not have come to him. Was a welcome surprise!"  
  
With just a groan, Gendry pulled the blanket over his head and turned away from Thonas."  
  
"We are leaving for Winterfell?" Gendry threw back the blanket to face Thonas.  
  
"Of course."  
  
He didn't want to tell his friend that he'd thought Arya only came to him in a dream."  
  
Thonas nodded and patted him on the back before standing and leaving the room.  
  
Both men left the armory of Casterly Rock with their weapons of choice.  
  
Gendry, however, only had a shortsword sheathed at his side, but a warhammer tucked into his belt at the back.  
  
They made their way to the bailey when they saw a cart loaded to the brim with crates of bricks, surrounded by Lannister servants adding more bricks to the cart. By the time the men came close, Gendry heard the lord ask her, "Are you sure you want to take this route?"  
  
The two were finally aware of both men, and Arya slipped her hands from the lord's and nodded. "And you?"  
  
The lord nodded then beamed a dazzling smile."  
  
Thonas ignored them both as he rubbed at his chin. "We're supposed to travel with a bloody cart full of bricks?"  
  
"Yes," Arya's answered, "bricks to rebuild Winterfell." She then plucked a brick from the bottom of the cart and threw it to the bare rock ground of the bailey with force.  
  
The brick cracked in half and at the center of the tiny pile of rubble were two gold dragons."  
  
"Two men?" Gendry's tone was far louder and more panicked than he would have preferred, but at least she would know exactly how he felt.  
  
"Word of my return is spreading fast."  
  
"A full month?" Gendry wanted to protest further, but Thonas interjected first. "And what will you do, m'lady?"  
  
"I have business to attend to.  
  
He didn't care that there were servants around them; he didn't care that the Lord Lannister was right there beside him.  
  
They held each other for a long moment before Arya pushed away from him, whispered something in the Lord Lannister's ear, slung a satchel on the saddle of her rounsey, and then mounted it with one hop.


	12. Road Weary

Gendry listened to Thonas recount his nights with women, mostly the woman from Casterly Rock's kitchens, and lament that he could no longer enjoy the "exquisite taste" of Dornish wine. It seemed he shared that preference in wine with the half lord.

Gendry didn't want to be reminded of Casterly Rock, and he didn't want to be reminded of the half-man. Both did nothing but bring to mind all that was wedged between him and Arya, whether he knew of it or not. What was hidden from him, the information she wouldn't share with him, was particularly painful to him and caused her to be even more unpredictable than her typical nature, which was already unnervingly unpredictable.

It was bad enough that he spent his quiet moments, those rare moments Thonas would afford him, thinking about what awaited him in Winterfell, what his life would be like there. He wondered if he could help Arya rebuild or if he would be needed at all. The load of coin hidden in the cart he drove could fund several smiths, the metal to keep them working for years, and the soldiers to make use of their work. What would she need of him?

And then there were the nights when Gendry would awaken to a shoe or pebbles thrown at his head. "Shut it!" Thonas would grumble. The next morn's journey, instead of listening to Thonas speak of women and wine, he would complain mightily of how Gendry said Arya's name in his sleep. Sometimes, it was soft as a whisper. Sometimes, it was a helpless cry. Sometimes… Gendry felt the rush of heat along his neck each time Thonas described those times in embarrassing detail.

All of this was not helped by the fact that there were times, distinct times, when Gendry felt as though he were being watched. The hair on his arms and the back of his neck would stand on end, and his already frayed nerves would wind tighter, looking for whoever it was that he was sure was following them.


	13. Friends, Old and New

When all five of them first entered the inn, a serving woman came to Gendry and Thonas, eying the two men with great interest. Hot Pie waved her away, explaining that he, Jeyne, and Willow would take care of them. It was almost laughable how quickly Thonas developed a pout, and Gendry wondered if the man grown would stomp his foot and cry like a babe.

Hot Pie led them to an empty table at the back of the main hall and sat with them as Jeyne and Willow disappeared in the back to get their meals and drink.

"It's hard work keepin' this inn open. The wars and winter took their toll on everyone." Gendry could only nod in agreement. Although he had what Davos gave him, plenty to pay for his room and board for years in Flea Bottom, and the memories during that time of his life were misty and vague having spent most of his time passively experiencing the world around him, he did see the others around him suffer.

He remembered children starving, woman crying, and men slumped over in defeat, not able to provide food to keep their families alive. Sometimes, Gendry would have the mental wherewithal to hand them a couple of copper stars for a meal and warm clothes, but most times, Gendry would pass by while absenting absorbing the events around him. He had his own demons to battle and hide from without taking on more sorrow.

Even so, even he recognized how bitter and desperate those winter days were, and somehow, Hot Pie and the two women survived them. "But how did you survive? I'd heard everyone here was killed with the last two owners and then endure winter on top of it all."


	14. Just Say So, Stupid

Jeyne insisted that Willow show Thonas and Gendry to their room. The two had to share, but it was better accommodations than they were expecting for the edge of the Riverlands.

Thonas plopped down on the bed and seemed wholly satisfied with the feel of it, while Gendry stood by the window and watched a man leave the inn on wobbly legs. It wasn't the most interesting sight to see, having seen his fill of it throughout the years, but it was better than turning to see what he knew awaited him.

Willow's back leaned against the frame of the door, and her eyes were on him. They'd been on him steadily since their meal, and Gendry felt a panic building within him. He couldn't bring himself to look at her because each time he did he felt the sudden urge to leave whatever room she was in.

"We'll pay you for the room," he told her while still looking out of the window.

"No you won't." The calm, resolute sound of her voice made him forget his fear for a moment and look up, only to find her eyes on him just as before, just as he'd expected. They were soft and sensual and very inviting, and Gendry wanted none of it. He turned his attention back to the window just before she said to him, "None of us will hear of it. You're our guests. Accept it."

With that, the door closed, and Gendry assumed Willow left the room when he heard Thonas speak from behind him. "The Lady Assassin has a twin in that girl. I think this is a featherbed."


	15. Seek Her Mercy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A big thanks to everyone who commented, kudo'd, and/or bookmarked this story.

After a good night's rest in a soft, warm bed, Gendry and Thonas had the cart and horses ready to continue their journey on the Kingsroad before the first rays of sunlight the next morn. Thonas hadn't said a word to him since Gendry returned early the night before and described what had happened with Willow. It wasn't what Thonas wanted to hear.

Gendry was convinced his friend had hoped Willow would be enough like Arya to tempt him into a commitment, that he would tell of plans to return to the inn after fulfilling his promise of helping Arya reclaim her title and property. Thonas might have even hoped that he would return with the news that Willow would join them to the north as his woman.

But none of that happened. In fact, his time with Willow had solidified his choice, strengthened his resolve. For whatever it held in his future, he chose Arya, and it was clear Thonas thought it was a grave mistake.

Hot Pie and Willow brought them enough sacks of smoked meat strips and skins of water for the entire ride to Winterfell.

No longer attentive, Willow was again the short-tempered woman she was when they'd first met, and the return to her disinterest relaxed him. He even enjoyed her company as they lifted the food and drink atop the cart. "And this one's for your friend." She patted one small, corked jug. "He seems the type to be more agreeable with some ale in his belly."

Gendry nodded with a smirk as she walked away from him, and when it came time to leave, his old friend stood next to the cart. Gendry placed a gold dragon in the palm of his hand. Hot Pie refused, holding out his hand to give back the dragon, but Gendry shook his head and wouldn't take it back. "No. That's for your babe. Keep safe, old friend."

Realizing that he wouldn't be able to argue, Hot Pie closed his fingers around the coin and gave Gendry a nod of thanks. The two old friends pulled each other into one last hug goodbye. "Keep them all safe," Gendry said softly in his friend's ear.

"And say hello to Arry for me," Hot Pie said back in a whisper. Gendry pulled away and studied the man's face, only to see an amused smile, but Hot Pie said nothing more. There was no use pretending otherwise, no use telling lies. Gendry just accepted defeat and nodded his head before he turned and stepped onto the cart.

As they rode away, Gendry took one last look to see Hot Pie holding Jeyne around her waist and Willow standing in the doorway of the inn.

But that was almost five days ago, and Gendry had spent half that time being ignored by his companion, and the other half wondering how far along the road Arya could've gotten traveling alone.

Ahead of them, they spotted a throng people walking toward them. Some looked up to see the men as they passed by, some didn't bother, but none seemed interested. Gendry hadn't seen faces as bleak and broken as these since the wars.

After a quarter of them walked by, Gendry noticed something strange: they were all women and children. Thonas trotted to the side of the cart and confirmed it with his question, "Do you see a man among them?"

Gendry craned his neck to get a better look at the people straggling at the end, and shook his head. "Not a one."

The two men tried to speak with the women, and all they got were wary looks from cautious eyes. Somewhere in the middle of the crowd was a girl, seemingly without a mother to hold her hand. "You, girl!" Gendry called to her, and she stopped in her place, looking up from the road. She seemed frightened, too afraid to move. "I'm not going to hurt you. I just want to know what happened here," Gendry assured her.

She fidgeted with the cloth of her dress and cast her gaze downward once again. It was only then that Gendry noticed the cloth and make of her dress. If not for the soot and road grime covering her, it might have been considered fancy and fit for a lady. Not that Gendry was all that familiar with the material, but it had the look of ragged silk.

"Some say it was a ghost," she told them. "Some say it was an attack. I woke up to everything on fire, and my father was dead. Everyone's father was dead. Even men who weren't fathers are dead." Her eyes flicked to the people around her before returning downward. "I was told we have to go to the Queen, seek her mercy." The girl shrugged her shoulders in defeat as she walked away from them and rejoined the slow pace of those around her. Before she slipped out of sight in the crowd, she said to them, "I don't know how much mercy we'll get seeing as the new king doesn't like Freys."

Gendry and Thonas looked at eat other, both trying to piece together in their minds the information given by the girl and all it meant: Freys, all the men dead, women told to go to the Queen. Women on the Kingsroad were always in danger, but they may find strength and security in their sheer numbers. Only guessing, it looked to be more than a hundred women on the road, not counting children.

As though reading his thoughts, Thonas pulled at his horse and it whinnied, getting Gendry's attention. "We have our own throats to protect!" He leaned in and said with a softer voice, "If anyone knew what we have in this cart, they'd slit them and leave our bodies on the road for the buzzards to pick."

It was the truth. They couldn't help those women any more than those women could help them. Gendry took one last look back and sighed.

By the time they made camp, Gendry couldn't sleep in his bedding. He tossed and turned, thinking about the little girl and all of the women and children walking the Kingsroad alone. They would reach the Crossroads Inn within days—Hot Pie and Jeyne would undoubtedly feed the hungry young mouths and do what they could for the women—but would the lot have enough food and water to even make that trip? And the distance to King's Landing was about a fortnight more.

His mind constantly turned back to the girl's words; something about the description unsettled him. Something about a ghost? It bothered him for the rest of the day.

Gendry turned to see Thonas asleep, a string of drool dangling from the corner of his mouth and glistening in the dying firelight. He couldn't quiet his busy head enough to do it, to sleep. He covered his eyes with his forearm and sighed. Ghost.

For a moment, he thought he heard loud breathy sounds from the woods near their camp, but he couldn't be certain with the loud crackling of their campfire. He turned an ear to the direction and concentrated on the distinct sounds around him. It was a heartbeat before he heard a twig snap and then a crunch. It was enough to startle Thonas awake, but the man knew enough not to make a sound and reveal to whoever it was that they were alert.

Something rustled woods just beyond their campfire light causing both Gendry and Thonas to jump to their feet. Then they heard footsteps, multiple footsteps. Thonas already had swords in hands—his natural instinct was to grab them—but it didn't occur to Gendry to reach for his warhammer until that moment.

The footsteps grew louder until they could hear them just at the tree line, and Thonas took a few steps closer to Gendry. "Who's there?" he called out, but there wasn't a response, only the sounds of twigs snapping under feet.

The lower limbs of the trees parted, revealing a long muzzle that Gendry couldn't fathom what kind of beast it belonged to. Leaving the cover of the woods, it revealed itself in the light of their fire. The head alone was intimidating in its size, but to see its entire form was the stuff of nightmares. The fur and general shape was wolf, but it was nearly the size of their horses. It stepped from the wood, and Gendry could make out a form beside it, someone walking alongside it.

Matted hair as wild as her eyes, it was Arya beside the beast, walking side by side as though it were a friend, a trusted companion. Something in his memory struggled to come to the fore as he heard Thonas breathe, "By the Seven. A direwolf."

The beast and woman approached, and Gendry saw the dark splatters across her face, her neck, covering her clothes, and he knew exactly what it was. Blood.

The great beast beside her was of no concern to him nor was the wild look in her eyes. He didn't think about them. His only thought was that she was bleeding and needed his help. He rushed to her, ignoring the low growl that stopped abruptly with the soft stroke of Arya's hand on the beast's shoulder, and Gendry cupped her face in his hands. Her eyes stared beyond him at nothing in particular.

"Arya, are you hurt?"

She didn't answer; she simple continued to stare into the darkness beyond the campfire light. His hands felt her face and neck for fever or bruises; he checked her clothes for holes, for bleeding wounds, any indication of injuries that he could find without her help because he didn't think he would get any as she was. Arya stood in her place, staring.

There were no wounds, nothing to cover her in blood, and yet, there she was covered in it. He cupped her face again and angled it to look up at him. Her eyes followed slowly, but blankly. "Arya?"

She blinked. There was a spark behind her eyes, followed by a few more blinks until finally her eyes focused on him, and the glint of recognition appeared on her face. "Gendry?"

Without hesitation, he pulled her to him and enveloped her in his arm. "It will be done," she said to him, her face against his chest. Her voice was weak, but strangely sounded in awe of her own words. He wanted to ask her what was done, if a slaughter was what awaited them in Winterfell. He wanted her to warn him of what they might be walking into, but he felt her body go limp against his body.

He tightened his grip on her before she slid to the ground, and he lifted her full weight in his arms, carrying her to his bedding. Thonas offered him some water to give to her, and it was only then that he remembered Thonas was there. "It will be done," she repeated, and before her eyes fluttered shut and she slipped into unconsciousness, she breathed the words, "Valar Morghulis."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _When you leave a comment, a fanfic fairy gets her wings._


	16. We Need to Talk

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A big thanks to everyone who commented, kudo'd, and/or bookmarked this story.

The night hadn't been easy. For half the night, Gendry lay beside Arya in his bedding staring at the endless sea of stars above, and the other half he stared at his eyelids, cursing quietly how sleep never came.

Arya slept peacefully curled up against the thick fur of Nymeria at her other side. There were no twitches or movements this time, not even soft grunts he'd heard before from her in her sleep. He did find some comfort in having her near him again, but his nerves were on edge, and his mind ran wild with threats of what lurked in the dark around them.

She hadn't regained consciousness since she returned to him, and her words haunted him just as the little girl's words had. Ghost…seek the queen's mercy…it will be done.

He was almost certain she was the ghost of the Twins, but how she managed to kill every man with barely a scratch or scrap made him fear her. She was deadly, something he knew from years ago, but he never imagined she was that deadly.

Thonas must have come to the same conclusion from the way he edged away from her and kept his eyes on her as though she would spring from her unconscious state and kill him. It didn't help that a direwolf, large and very much intimidating, never left her side.

And Gendry couldn't fathom why she would send the women and children on such a long journey to seek the queen's mercy. Arya had never shown much interest in the queen since her return.

But what preoccupied his mind the most was trying to make sense of her words before she slipped into unconsciousness. What will be done?

Throughout the night, he thought to wake her so that they might, just possibly, speak. Not that conversation was easy to come by between them. Arya was action, and he was not a man with a competent tongue...at least, he'd learned from Arya, not with words.

It was before dawn when Arya stirred beside him and rose from their bedding, heading for the trees. Gendry stopped her, holding her hand in his and hoping he could keep her from leaving him; he didn't want to part from her again. He didn't want her to leave again and kill off another House. Their goal of restoring the good name of her family's legacy was already going to be a battle enough for her as a woman without adding more against her. He wasn't savvy with the politics of the highborn, but he knew enough that if you attack one, the others don't tolerate it one bit.

With a warm, almost shy smile, Arya turned to him. She didn't pull away, but her eyes didn't meet his.

The truth of it was that he couldn't keep her tethered to his side, and so he released her hand and watched her disappear into the woods with Nymeria at her side.

Thonas wouldn't allow him to sulk, convincing him that he needed to eat some food and drink water while waiting for the "Lady Assassin" to return, but he wondered if she would.

By the time the sun rose to the edge of the horizon and the soft, new rays of daylight filtered through the sheet of clouds, Arya reappeared without her direwolf. Her wet hair clung to her face and neck, and the blood no longer covered her skin. She now wore leather breeches and a jerkin and a roughspun tunic, fresh clothes free of the blood that covered the clothes bundled in her arms.

Arya mounted the horse they used for riding, and gave Thonas direction to drive the cart. Thonas didn't complain; he considered it a respite for his sore bum and groin, at least that's what he told them, but Gendry wondered how much of his obedience had to do with a possible new fear of her.

Arya waited for Gendry, and it took him a moment to realize she expected him to climb on the horse, that they would share the ride for their day's journey.

It took some very ungraceful effort, but he managed to pull himself up onto the beast and behind Arya; his arms locked firmly around her waist.

Arya's soft scent wafted from her hair to his nose, and Gendry had to suppress the need to lower his face into it and breathe deeply. It was something he'd been denied for days, and yet, there were more important things to do.

"What will be done, Arya? Are we in danger?"

She continued to look ahead, but her body tensed in his arms, her back a little straighter, and her hands gripping the reins tighter. "No more than always," she finally said to him nonchalantly, but then remained quiet, seemingly caught in her own thoughts.

"Gendry?"

His name on her lips was as beautiful as the sweetest song, as soft and vulnerable as it was, and he leaned into her so that she didn't have to raise her voice or change her pitch. He wanted to hear her say his name like that more, and cursed his body for taking such complete control of him.

"Would you still lo…would you still care if you knew the things I've done?"

"What have you done that I don't know?" he asked, not sure if he truly wanted to know.

Her words were still soft and low, but the story they wove was something entirely different. Atop their horse, she described murders of all sorts; so many people died at her hands in the free cities, and the only remorse he could glean from her was that she feared what he would think of her.

And then came the account of the Twins: how she slipped in among the smallfolk looking for work, how she waited until some lord named Black Walder returned for the wedding of a favorite cousin, how she poisoned the food for the wedding feast, sparing only that reserved for the children's meal.

Arya methodically made her way to each door of each chamber, slitting the throats of the men who had survived the poisoning, some alert and confused but most lost in a fog of sleep. Most women survived because ladies were always encouraged to eat very little.

There was one chamber Arya entered where the woman was fully alert. She hadn't eaten a morsel of the meal, dreading her wedding night with her new husband known for being a cruel man. And he was, especially to her that night. She sat on the bed next to the lump of man that was her new husband with her arms tightly wrapped around her drawn legs, bruises blossomed all along her body and blood at her thighs.

Her husband beside her was still alive, the rise and fall of his chest could be seen from the door, and when Arya offered the knife and the opportunity, the woman didn't hesitate to cut his throat wide open. It was an ugly thing to see because it was not done with the finesse of her skilled hands but with the angry, resentful hands of a woman abused.

Arya then gave her one last action to follow: take the remaining women and children to King's Landing and seek the mercy of Queen Daenerys.

"Children died?"

The sound of her answer was simple, yet strained. "Yes." It was at that moment that she decided to turn and face him, as best she could on their horse, and forced herself to look him in the eye. "I tried to spare as many as I could. It had to be done, Gendry." She then turned back to face the road and breathed the words he'd heard from her the night before. "Valar Morghulis."

He tasted the bile rise up his throat when he thought of children dying in her war, and the rage swelled and struggled to break free to demand she answer all of his questions, particularly what in the hells was "valar morghulis?" He wrestled with it, not wanting to lose his temper with her, and almost lost when a man stepped out of the trees ahead of them.

Their horse, startled by the unexpected intruder, whinnied and reared, and Gendry held Arya tighter.

Other men stepped out of the woods around them with smug smiles and leisurely gaits, effectively blocking the road.

"What have we here? Two men…and a woman?"

Another eyed Arya and Gendry didn't have to follow his line of sight to see that his eyes were on her chest and how the jerkin she wore did little to hide her bosom. "Definitely a woman, I'd say. Think she's the one?"

The men around them took moments to consider them, and Gendry eyed Thonas still on the cart and reaching for one of his swords when one of the men leveled a long blade to his neck, "I wouldn't do that if I were you."

Arya took Gendry's hand and gave it a squeeze before she gently shifted her leg over the horse and slid down with all the grace and dignity of the highborn that she was. "Are you here to escort me?" she asked them with such a sweet, innocent voice and demure bearing, Gendry had to remind himself that it was Arya.

One of the men raised an eyebrow and a slow smile spread across his dirty, stubbled face. "So you _are_ Lady Arya," he said as he gave a bow that was too low and too grand to be anything but mocking.

"Yes. I am Lady Arya Stark of Winterfell. And I am so relieved that you have come to help escort me." She flitted her way to the man's side and touched his arm gently. "It has been an awful experience having to wear these clothes," she said as she gestured to her breeches, jerkin, and tunic, "But my good brother told me it would be safer than a gown and a wheelhouse."

"Ah…yes…well…" the man stammered as he scratched the back of his neck, visibly relaxing that they had nothing more to contend with than a simpering lady and only two protectors. And it wasn't him alone; relaxation seemed to spread among the men as more revealed themselves from the wood. These men obviously didn't have any good intentions, and there were far too many far too interested in studying Arya's curves on display by her menswear for Gendry's liking.

Suddenly, the men in front of Arya staggered backward, spooked by something they'd seen on her face that Gendry couldn't see, and in the next moment Nymeria bounded out of the trees and attacked two of the men, already targeting her third victim. That left seven.

Thonas hopped off of the cart with both swords drawn and took on four of the men nearest him while the men closest to Arya attacked after recovering from their stunned moment. By that point, she'd already drawn Needle from the saddle of the horse, spun with such grace it could have easily been mistaken for floating on air, and slit the throat of the closest man to her, ending with her fighting stance. They laughed until the first man dropped to the ground with blood everywhere.

"Bitch!" one cried as he rushed at her, his sword high over him and nothing but rage in his eyes. Somehow, some way, Gendry was there with his warhammer with no memory of dismounting the horse or reaching for his weapon, and stopped the sword in its stroke downward before it could even come close to Arya between them. The force felt as though it would wrench his arm from his body, but he held firm.

In front of him, Arya crouched low and sliced the man at the knees which a dagger she always kept strapped to her thigh, hidden inside her clothes, and stabbed him in the heart before another could even reach them. Gendry swung his hammer and the second man fell back and twitched.

A third came at them, bigger than Gendry and deadlier looking than Arya, but Gendry swung his hammer at him as well. This time the man pulled back and missed the swing, but Arya twirled as though she were dancing, slashing several times at his chest and belly. Catching the man stunned by his wounds, that's when Gendry swung his hammer a second time and hit his mark. The man fell to the ground and didn't move. For good measure, Arya slit his throat.

They both stood back to back and surveyed the scene around them. Nymeria panted over her five kills while Thonas was finishing his second. Gendry could barely breathe; he couldn't think. He just knew that he was still alive and Arya was still alive and in that moment, he wanted to prove it. Without a thought to what was right or wrong or sane, Gendry grabbed Arya's arm and pulled her to him and lifted her by the waist, then crushed his lips to hers. She didn't protest or fight him; she let him do it. In fact, her arms wrapped around his neck and deepened their kiss.

He didn't care how Thonas swore or how many bodies were strewn around them or that Nymeria began to tear at their flesh, chewing as she went. He had her in his arms, and they were alive. And by the Seven he was going to revel in that miracle.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Fanfic authors live on caffeine and comment. Please help feed a fanfic author today!_


	17. A Woman and Her Smith

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A big thanks to everyone who commented, kudo'd, and/or bookmarked this story.

After the attack on the road, they spent the rest of the day traveling north to put as much distance between the carnage and themselves as possible, and they didn't stop until the sun had gone down completely with too little light from the moon to even consider continuing.

With Nymeria's help, they found a spot to camp just off of the road and this time Gendry started the fire. Usually, he was the one to gather the wood. "Put those big arms of yours to good use," Thonas would say, but he was also the best at starting fires in almost complete darkness, something he'd learned to do apprenticing to Tobho Mott.

It was so quiet around the fire, each of them lost in their thoughts of what had happened to them on the road, and what it meant for them and their futures. Arya crouched in her spot and stared at the fire, eyes blazing just as much, absentmindedly scratching a spot behind her direwolf's ear.

Thonas was the one to break them from the inward thoughts. "Who were they?"

"Not a sigil to be found on them. Could've been those loyal to the Freys," she said, then added with a lesser breath, "if there are any left. I doubt that, though." Arya stood, her direwolf standing with her, and stared into the flames with an intensity that gave Gendry a chill along his spine.

"I plan to knight the two of you when we reach Cerwyn," she told them without looking beyond the fire.

"Me? A knight?" Thonas said then whistled. "Do you know how easily clothing slips from women's bodies at the mere mention of the title 'ser'?"

That pulled Arya from her focus on the fire toward Thonas. "Don't force me to rethink it."

As a sign that he hadn't meant any offense, Thonas lifted his hands as if to yield and reached for his swords, starting his routine of cleaning, sharpening, cleaning the blades.

Arya's gaze immediately shifted to Gendry, and he knew why. Knighthood was one step closer to the world of noblemen, a position he wanted no part of. Even in the dim firelight and the darkness around them, he could see her eyebrows quirk upward in helplessness and her proud stance faltered for a heartbeat. Her jaw clenched, and she said to him words that hit him as though she'd just struck him across the head with one of the pieces of firewood.

"I'm sorry Gendry, but I have to. I plan to name you the Castellan of Winterfell." Her gaze dropped to the ground in front of her. "And Thonas will be Master-at-arms," she added, but that didn't register to him as deeply as the words before.

Gendry heard a choking sound coming from Thonas's direction, but he didn't look at his friend; he didn't look away from Arya for even a moment. He couldn't think clearly as he tried to grasp what she was telling him. His eyes locked with hers at that, and he tried to force a smile that he wasn't sure he succeeded in achieving. "I guess I can be a knight. It's not like I'll be a lord, but I don't know the first thing of what a castellan is or does."

She rushed to him, knelt before him, and took his hands in hers. "And I don't know how to be a lady, but we can learn to do it our way. We can teach them what real nobility can be, Gendry." This time, her intense gaze was directed at him. Eyes wide and looking as worried as he'd ever seen her, he knew she feared he wouldn't accept it. But how could he not? Didn't she know that he would move mountains for her if he could? That he would give himself to the whim of his uncle and the red witch for her. That she was his reason to wake every morn. Didn't she know that her words, telling of how she wanted him in her life, was worth more to him than his hatred of lords and ladies and castles?

So when he withdrew his hands from hers, she flinched at the perceived rejection and dropped her gaze. He quickly cupped her face, insisting that she meet his gaze again. "I'll be what you need me to be," was all he could say before he pressed his lips to hers.

The muscles along her jaw relaxed, and she moaned into the kiss. She'd given herself to the kiss wholly, which was why it surprised him when she pulled away and stood, but didn't move a step more away. She just stood there and looked down at him for a long moment before unstrapping and unbuttoning her jerkin and then tossed it aside; her tunic quickly followed.

He froze in his spot; he could do nothing but look up at the glorious, half-naked wild woman before him. The only thing he could pull himself together long enough to do was reach out and wrap his arms around her waist, pulling her close to him. It wasn't until he heard Thonas's exasperated cry, "Oh Seven Hells!" that he remembered his friend was still near them. The clank and clatter of metal and whetstone hitting the ground and the sound of feet stomping heavily, moving away from them told him all he needed to know: Thonas was fed up with them again and left the camp.

Gendry didn't care. Thonas would forgive them when he had plenty of women to bed with the title "ser" to his name. All Gendry wanted was one woman. All he would ever want would be one woman, and if he had to prance around in the world of noblemen to have her, he would willingly.

Nuzzling the smooth, firm skin of her belly, he could have stayed this way, holding her like this for the rest of the night, but it seemed Arya had other plans. He felt a tug at the shoulders of his tunic and when he pulled back, she pulled the thing over his head forcefully. He untied the thong of her breeches and allowed it to drop down to her feet and he worshipped the patch of dark curls leading to his sacred place.

Soft and inviting, he had to touch her, to feel his fingers slide through the curls and part her. To give him better access, she parted her legs and he gently slipped his two fingers between her folds that won him a gasp from her. He brushed against the knot, the one he'd learned gave her so much pleasure, and was rewarded with another gasp, then a moan.

He looked up to see her head back and her eyes closed. This is what he learned to do for her, when he was too quick and she wasn't done, this could finish her. In fact, he'd learned that he could help her find her pleasure in it multiple times if done to her liking.

With the moisture already there, he slipped further, deeper until his fingers came to her opening and then he dipped them as far as they could go, marveling at the proof of her need for him.

Her fingers ran through his hair and grabbed a fistful as he felt and fondled his way to her completion. With one hand he held her hip steady while with the other he held firmly against the pulsing heat of her release. She began to sway, and he pulled her down to kneel with him. It didn't take long for her fingers to work at the thong of his breeches and slide them down his thighs to his knees.

And when he tried to stand, to remove his breeches fully, she pulled him back down and wrapped her arms about his neck, curling into his lap with legs smoothly surrounding him.

They both ignored the cold nose sniffing near their arms and faces, or when it huffed loudly and blew warm air at them. Nymeria would understand eventually that her human companion had more pressing matters. And she did, quietly walking away and curling into a spot near them by the campfire's warmth.

Arya eased down on him, rounding her hips to slip him into position, and the feel of her enveloping him slowly and fully was enough for his eyes to roll back and his jaw to slacken. "Gods woman, you'll be the death of me."

"Say it again," she commanded as she continued downward, the words tight and strained on her lips.

It wasn't as though he had the ability to think beyond the feel of her warm and wet and tight around him, but he managed to repeat himself. "You'll be the death of me."

"No," she breathed hard and then produced the sweetest moan as she lifted herself up from his length before continuing, "woman. Call me woman."

"Woman?" He was confused, and in truth, the last thing he wanted was to think at the moment. The words tumbled out of his mouth along with others that were more fragments of thoughts and feelings, "Woman…my woman…my wild, wondrous, beautiful woman." His voice clipped and cracked as his mouth and his cock fought for total control of his body while she slid back down on him with more speed and force.

But the words only spurred her onward, rocking her hips atop him, lifting herself slightly from him with her strong legs and picking up her pace. Her face scrunched with purpose, working very hard toward her end. Her grunts and moans, along with how so very tight and so very warm she was, gripping him despite how wet she was for him, brought him closer to his.

It wasn't long before her back ached, her head dropped back with her lips parted, and her hands clawed at his shoulders. By the Seven, if not for wanting to make this last, he would have spilled his seed into her at the mere sight of her. He loved watching her like this; he missed watching her float down from her peak. It didn't help that her inner spasms pulsed and massaged his cock in incredible ways.

"My bull-headed smith," she breathed, still in the throes of her pleasure.

He wanted to hear it again. He wanted to hear those words on her lips again, so he pulled her down to him and leaned her back to the ground so that he hovered above her, then scooped her shoulders into his arms. Still inside her, he pulled his hips back and fought his own pleasure to watch her react to the feeling. "Say it again," he commanded her, and she didn't argue or reject it. In fact she purred, "My bull-headed smith."

With her response, he snapped his hips forward causing her to gasp. Then she mewled, "My bull-headed smith."

The words were exactly what he wanted to hear as he pulled back and thrust into her again, causing her to repeat the words that were already bringing him close again. He continued this way until he was sure she was close, writhing and panting below him, repeating over and over that he was hers, he was her bull-headed smith.

And when he knew she was so near her peak, he allowed himself to give in to his own pleasure. His hips moved of their own accord and he reveled in the scent of Arya in his nose, her skin smooth and slick with sweat in his arms, and her so very warm and tight around his cock until his release came quick and strong. There was no room for anything or anyone in this moment than Arya, and he held her tightly to him as though afraid she would disappear.

For a long moment, he was lost in the rush of his release and when the fog cleared, he realized his full weight was on her. With what little strength he had left, Gendry pulled himself up only to have Arya pull him back down, curling her arms around him. He did manage to slide down so that he could rest his head on her chest and listened to her rapid heartbeat slowly work its way to a steadier rhythm.

He didn't feel like dressing for Thonas's benefit. Instead, he simply reached for their blanket and pulled it over himself, covering them both. After all that had happened this day, not to mention the whole journey from Casterly Rock, this was how he wanted to fall asleep: in her arms.

* * *

The birds were chirping to the new morn by the time Gendry roused from his sleep, and when he opened his eyes, there was no Arya beside him. Across the fire Thonas slept soundly in his bed roll, but there wasn't even a sign of Nymeria. He sat upright with his knees bent and arms resting on them, the blanket draped across his middle.

Had she left him? Would she leave him again?

It was then that he heard the rustling in the brush near their camp, and Arya stepped out of it with Nymeria close beside her. The direwolf seemed as attached to her as he was, as desperate to keep Arya as close to her as possible. If only he could be so lucky.

Arya continued to walk toward him, wringing water out from her hair onto the ground.

"You're awake," she said as though she hadn't expected him to be. Squatting next to him and with a thick cloth in her hand, she grabbed a clay jug Gendry recognized to be the very one that had carried Thonas's ale from the Crossroads Inn. The very one he'd emptied over two days ago. Unnoticed until that moment, it was propped upright against the fire.

There were three cups, fairly well-made, nearby as well. From the look of them, they weren't meant for travel but someone's home, and he wondered if she stole it from where she'd been.

She filled one of the cups with the heated water for him. Before she held it out to him, she'd plopped a wooden stick into it, strange and brown and curled into itself. As he sipped it and tasted the pleasant earthy flavor, he watched as she pinched some of her herbs into her own cup of heated water.

"Is that moon tea?" he asked as heat crept up his neck all the way to his ears and cheeks. "Thonas told me more about it, but he said you shouldn't drink it so often."

Arya's eyes darted in his direction for a heartbeat before looking away and drawing the cup away from her lips. "The herbs don't make moon tea, but the result's the same. Moon tea forces a woman's blood, and the more taken, the harder it is on the body. My blend's milder, but must be taken daily."

He would've preferred the wonders of women's bodies to remain a mystery, but to assure himself that she kept his seed from taking root in her belly and that she wouldn't harm herself in the process, he had to ask. "Good. Can't have any bastards running around Winterfell." He tried to sound as light-hearted as he could about it, but saying those words aloud hurt more than just knowing it as the truth.

A hard edge formed in Arya's eyes, and she stopped drinking her tea. "I'd rather birth ten decent bastards than one pompous lordling!" she forced out through gritted teeth, then gulped her tea and wiped her mouth with the back of the same hand. The next thing he knew, she was standing over him, and her cup hit the ground in front of him with a loud thunk and bounced to the side.

Before she could storm away from him completely, he grabbed hold of her wrist. "When all's said and done, I think bastards have it worse than those having no name at all." If only he could make her understand how his life turned to shit because of being a bastard. His apprenticeship was, more than likely, also because of his bastard status, but it was nothing more than a small detail in a greater picture. What's an apprenticeship when people want to kill you before you have a chance to use your skill?

"I stand by my words," she said, then yanked her hand from his to walk away from him and toward the cart. The last thing he heard from her was, "Wake Thonas. It's time to leave."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Each comment left is like a little piece of the puzzle. Let's finish the picture together. :)_


	18. The Voice of Winterfell

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A big thanks to everyone who commented, kudo'd, and/or bookmarked this story.

Having spent days sitting behind her on their horse, Arya hadn't said a word to him since their discussion about babes and bastards and her tea. Ten days, and the rift between them had remained the same. Each day, he reminded himself that he had every right to say those words, even if she didn't want to hear them, even if she had some strange notion of how it was good and "noble" to be a bastard. Each day he would feel his skin prickle and itch with annoyance of how she dared to tell him how much better bastards were.

He was a bastard—a fat, drunk and very dead king's bastard—and was nearly killed then nearly sacrificed on a pyre for it. And the bits and pieces that she told him of her bastard half-brother's life were not much better.

Still, when her body went rigid with his arms around her waist whenever they rode together, or when she refused to even look his way in their camp at night, or when she wouldn't speak to him no matter how he tried to start safely idle conversation, it killed him a little each day. The worst was when she no longer slept with him, choosing to curl into Nymeria's furry form some distance away from him. It killed him all the same, no matter how true his words to her were that day.

"Arya," he said her name pleadingly in her ear as they spent yet another day on the damned horse, "I'm sorry." His words that day were the truth—they both knew it—but he couldn't continue as they had.

She shifted in the saddle and turned to look at him. At that moment, her eyes reminded him of gentle rainclouds with not a trace of the hard, steely glint often found in them. He could see the forgiveness in them, and her lips parted to say the words that would end his misery when Thonas called out to them, "Cerwyn!"

Arya turned to look in the direction of where Thonas pointed, and there it was, the small castle in the middle of the northern wilds. In his mind, he cursed Castle Cerwyn, Thonas, and the damned horse that made his groin ache from the constant riding. Whatever moment he managed to form with her, the circumstance where peace could be made between them, it disappeared at the first sight of their destination.

Her eyes focused ahead, watching the men on horseback approach them at full gallop. Escorts for the Lady Arya Stark was how they introduced themselves. Unlike the men on the road days ago, these men were dressed in armor that was finely made, even if a bit worn.

By the time they reached the castle walls, the bustle and excitement behind them could be heard. The gate opened at their approach revealing a man with much the same look as Arya: same brown color of hair, grey eyes and shape of face. His expression was somber, and at his side stood a direwolf of Nymeria's size, if not slightly bigger, with cloud-white fur and demon red eyes. Arya did tell him years ago that each Stark child had a direwolf, but he'd never seen such a creature as the one at the gates.

Necks craned and heads bobbed with people in the background as the smallfolk surrounded the inner gate, keeping their distance from the man and direwolf but desperate for a glimpse of the Lady Arya.

Bounding toward the man and wolf, Nymeria stopped in front of the man first, sniffed, then stood in front of the direwolf. Both sniffed and considered each other for a long moment before it seemed they agreed neither was a threat. There was some familiarity in the way they interacted, and Gendry wondered if they remembered they'd been littermates.

It was then that Nymeria turned and raced for the tree line at the edge of the nearby forest. It had to have been the Wolfswood described to him once, the woodland bordering the east of both Cerwyn and Winterfell.

The white direwolf considered Nymeria's direction, looked toward the man standing beside him, and raced towards the woods as well. Unlike Nymeria's deep, rumbling pants and heavy footfalls, this direwolf made no sound at all.

"Jon?" Arya breathed which confirmed what Gendry had already suspected: the man standing at the gate to welcome them was her half-brother, the bastard Stark.

She shimmied out of Gendry's arms and leapt off of the horse with her usual ease, and as soon as her feet hit the ground, she darted towards her brother. The man's expression softened, and he smiled with his arms held out widely, welcoming the woman barreling toward him, colliding into an embrace.

They stayed this way for the whole time it took Gendry and Thonas to reach them: their arms wrapped tightly around the other, Arya's head nestled into his chest, his lips kissing the crown of her head. For the first time, Gendry could truly see Arya as someone's little sister.

Even when they were younger, when he knew she was the little sister of the King in the North, he had a hard time picturing her this way. She was always in control, always taking lead of the moment, but in the arms of Jon Snow he glimpsed the girl Arya had once told him was called "Arya Underfoot."

By the time he and Thonas reached the two, Arya made the effort to pull away from him and try to regain her composure. She wiped a tear from her cheek and smiled at Jon while tilting her head in Thonas and Gendry's direction, "Tyrion sent word of them?"

When Jon nodded, she began the introductions. "This is Thonas," she said as she pointed to the cart's driver then pointed to the rider of the horse, "and this is Gendry."

The bastard Stark gave Thonas a nod of acknowledgment, but when she said Gendry's name, Jon's entire demeanor changed: his body went rigid, his eyes locked hard on him, and his hands balled into tight fists. There was a distinct possibility that the man would try to hit Gendry at any moment.

Oblivious to the changes in her half-brother—or seemingly so since Arya rarely missed anything in body language—she continued, "This is my brother, Jon Snow," but the man's eyes remained cold and hard on Gendry.

There was no doubt, however, that Thonas did see the changes. Clearing his throat and speaking up, he managed to draw the attention away from Gendry and to himself. "Mind if we get this cart from the out and open?"

"Yes, of course," Jon nodded, relaxing only slightly as he led them to where they would store the cart.

"It's been so long…" the Lady Jonella Cerwyn welcomed while approaching them from the opposite side of the courtyard, "…Arya." Behind her there were servants carrying platters of turnip chips and wine. She didn't, however, signal them to offer Arya, Gendry, or Thonas the food and drink until Jon gave an answering nod to her questioning look. As the three ate and drank, Thonas eating more than a handful of the chips and drinking far more than a sip, the Lady Jonella forced a smile and welcomed them fully into her castle.

There was a girl, couldn't be more than two and ten, and a man waiting for them by Lady Cerwyn's side. "Rellie will show you to your chambers, Lady Arya, and assist you into proper attire. And your men—"

Before the Lady Cerwyn could finish her sentence, Jon Snow interrupted with his request, "If you don't mind, Lady Jonella, I can show Arya's men to their rooms."

"Of course," the Lady nodded as though she was relieved by his gesture, lifting her silk gown off of the ground, turning, and immediately leaving the courtyard. The girl, Rellie, started to lead Arya away when Jon took hold of Arya's arm, and in response her eyes flashed a hint of anger before they softened. Lucky for him she accepted what might have gotten a man of lesser importance to her gutted.

His words were barely more than a whisper, but Gendry could still hear them. "The northern lords are waiting for you. It's important to not take too long Arya. It's very important."

Gendry thought it was strange how he stressed the importance of the meeting of the lords as though Arya didn't know, but then he remembered how Jon knew the Arya before, the more innocent Arya. He knew the Arya that didn't take her duties seriously, and Gendry felt badly for the brother who was so unaware of how a little sister he'd known so well died long ago.

As though she understood this sad truth as well, no anger flashed in her eyes, and there was no hard set of resentment in her jaw; there was simply a warm, loving smile as her hand cupped his cheek. "Yes, brother," she said to him before turning and following Rellie into the Keep.

Jon Snow led their way into the Keep and remained silent for the entire duration. The first room they came upon Jon Snow explained was Thonas's, and when his friend opened the door and entered, his eyes bulged as they took in the opulence of the room, at least opulent by the standards Thonas was used to. Gendry, however, had had a similar room in Casterly Rock.

The man started to laugh nervously, and Gendry wondered if the prospect of finer living had broken his friend.

"Seven hells, Gendry! If I'd known I'd be living like this, I wouldn't 've minded all those nights with you and the La…dy…" Thonas stopped and cleared his throat while Jon Snow inhaled sharply. Both Gendry and Thonas eyed the man as though he was a beast about to attack, but he only closed his eyes and took a long, deep breath.

Without a word, Jon started to walk down the passageway. Thonas shrugged and gave him an apologetic look before Gendry did the only thing he could do: follow Arya's half-brother.

When they were well away from Thonas's door, Jon Snow muttered something to him that Gendry didn't quite catch. "Do you know what Arya has in store for you?" he repeated.

"To knight me and make me Castellan of Winterfell," Gendry answered, knowing fully his confusion seeped through his voice. He wanted it to be there because he _was_ confused and worried and a dozen other emotions tied to Arya and her damned plans.

"And do you know what that means for you?" the man asked him while they continued their walk.

"Not at all. I told Arya as much, but she seems so…" He couldn't think of the word for it, for her determination to bestow him with knighthood and some position that he had no idea existed until she said it. What in the hells did a castellan do?

Jon Snow chuckled to himself. "That sounds like Arya."

They stopped at a door, and he gestured for Gendry to open it. He was going to tell her half-brother of how he didn't think her decision was a wise one. How she needed people who understood nobility, but when the door swung open, the words stuck in his throat and choked him. He had to cough several times to right himself and took a tentative step into the room as wide-eyed as Thonas had with the other room.

An elegantly carved bed layered with beautifully embroidered blankets and pillows was in the center of what looked to be a room large enough to house three full families in Flea Bottom. It was far more than the room he was given in Casterly Rock, but with its size and finery, it did remind him of the room where the red witch had…no, that was a different room, he reminded himself. Although it did nothing to stave off the chill that crept up his spine.

Gendry turned to Jon Snow questioningly. "There's been some mistake. This room is a lord's room."

The man took a sweeping look around with a slightly amused grin then focused squarely on him. "For all intents and purposes, you're going to be the Castellan of Winterfell, the voice of Arya as she is the Lady of Winterfell. Therefore, you will be the voice of Winterfell. And because she is a woman, you're voice as a man may, at times and to many lords, have more weight than hers. In essence, Gendry, you will be the closest thing to the Lord of Winterfell…until Arya marries."

The words hit him in the gut and squeezed the air out of his chest. He had to hold on to the door for balance as he tried to stop the room from spinning and silence the ringing in his ears. "Closest thing to the Lord of Winterfell?" he repeated numbly.

He didn't know what was worse: that he would have that kind of position and responsibility or that when he was finally relieved of it, it also meant that he would lose Arya.

"Speaking of intents and purpose," Jon Snow said carefully after taking in his reaction, "I wondered what your intentions were with Arya. If she were more like Sansa I would still wonder, but she's Arya. There's some difference, now. I see it, but she's still Arya. So I have to wonder what intentions she has for you."

There was nothing he could say, absolutely nothing. Even though he was the closest person to Arya, of that he was certain, Gendry knew there were still hidden facets that he didn't know. In truth, he came to the realization that he may never know them.

Jon Snow took one last glance around the room before leaving, closing the door behind him. Gendry felt the walls of the cavernously large room closing in on him.

* * *

Gendry sat at the foot of the bed with his head in his hands for what seemed like half the day. There was a soft click followed by the sound of footsteps, then another soft click. He didn't have to look up to know who it was.

"I didn't think you would come to me," he said to her flatly without lifting his head. There was a long silence until finally Gendry couldn't take it any longer and looked up at her. She stood at the door in a lady's gown of silk and her hair styled in a very simple, yet pleasing fashion, fidgeting under his gaze. His first reaction, the one of which he had little control, was the twitch of his cock followed by the rapid thumping in his chest.

He ignored his body. "What do you expect of me, Arya? What are your plans for me?"

Smoothing out the wrinkles along the bottom of her gown in frustration, she said to him with an exasperated sigh, "If the northern lords should get only one glimpse of the lady they expect rather than the one they'll get, I suppose it should be my reintroduction to the northern nobility."

"I asked you a question, woman!" he spat as he bolted from the bed. "What is it you expect of me? Your brother told me what a castellan does, what I'll be." His words only stoked the fire inside him that was ignited by memories resurfacing and the fears of what his future title meant. He was emotionally and physically weary. And to make matters worse, his body couldn't decide if it wanted to be angry or aroused. Either way, his path to her was quick and predatory, pushing his way into her personal space. She didn't back away, and there was no fear in her eyes.

In fact, she leaned forward, pushing further into his personal space with her head cocked to the side, daring him to challenge her further. "I thought you would be whatever I needed you to be?" And she poked a finger into his chest for good measure.

Reminded of his own words, Gendry lost much of the anger that had festered into something close to resentment while sitting on the bed thinking of his future role. His shoulders slumped in defeat. "You slip in and out of the skin of one person to the next without much effort." He noticed a slight quirk of her eyebrow and a twitch at one corner of her mouth at that, but he continued on. "An assassin, a friendly serving woman, a helpless lady, a little sister. You said you would never lie to me, Arya. So I ask you, who are you when you stand here before me?"

For a moment, so quick it could have been his imagination, Gendry thought he saw fear flicker across her face as she pulled at her lower lip with her teeth. She no longer leaned into him threateningly and her shoulders slumped in defeat to match his; her gaze fell to her feet.

He wouldn't allow her to leave him without an answer, even if it would cost him his life. He watched her carefully as she lifted her head and stared to the side of them, her eyes focusing on anything and everything but him until she finally muttered in a voice barely more than a whisper, "A woman in love."

For what seemed like eternity, Gendry lost all control of his body. He felt his jaw slacken and his mouth gape; he felt his body quake and his ears thumped with his pulse as he watched Arya standing before him almost shyly. The declaration had made her vulnerable.

Since she'd asked him about it, he wondered if what he felt for her was love, having barely grasped the meaning of the word. The idea that someone would feel it for him was never truly important to him, but for Arya to feel it for him…

He scooped her into his arms, covering her face with kisses and nuzzling into the hair behind her ear, all the while desperately trying to keep the water in his eyes at bay.

He pressed his forehead to hers and struggled to breathe since his chest couldn't seem to take in enough air. They stayed this way for quite some time before Gendry set her feet back onto the floor.

Their eyes met, and Arya unfastened the clasp of her gown, never retreating from his gaze. Gendry slid half of her gown and her shift off of her shoulder until it gathered at her elbow, making sure to caress her smooth skin along the way. Her breast was still hidden from him, but it made no difference. He kissed her shoulder, his tongue tasting, his teeth nipping all the way down to the curve of the breast now revealed to him. The peak was pebble hard, and he cradled it with the flat of his tongue at the same moment a knock came from the door.

Gendry jumped back from her as Arya quickly righted her gown and refastened the clasp in three heartbeats. He froze in his place as she made her way to the door and opened it. Jon Snow walked in and considered the two of them, mostly Arya, for a long moment. His hand reached out and returned a lock of hair to its place in her simple braided style. "I thought I would find you here," he said to her before walking toward Gendry.

It was only then that Gendry noticed the clothes draped across Jon Snow's arm that also carried a bucket of water. "It's why I told the servant I would bring these for you, Gendry," he handed them to him then turned to Arya. "You're needed in the Great Hall, Arya. Gendry and I have some preparations to attend to."

Arya didn't bother to hide her disappointment, even as she curtsied exaggeratedly to both and left the room.

Jon Snow turned to Gendry and sighed, "The two of you play a dangerous game."

"Arya makes the plans and plays the game," Gendry replied while filling a wash basin with water and splashing his face with it. Having Jon Snow interrupt them dampened his need for the man's sister, but the cold water helped further. He was still nervous when he thought of his role in her plans, but his mind was too preoccupied with thoughts of Arya, reveling in the pride and warmth in his chest as he thought of her words to him. "I can only hope they don't get her killed and try to help keep her safe while she makes them."

Jon Snow nodded in full agreement.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _A comment a day keeps the writer's block away!_


	19. The Noble North

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A big thanks to everyone who commented, kudo'd, and/or bookmarked this story.

The Great Hall of Cerwyn Castle was not very great, at least compared to the only other Great Hall Gendry had ever seen in Casterly Rock. Packed with ladies and lords and their servants high and low, it seemed even smaller.

Given to him earlier by Jon—that's what Arya's half-brother allowed Gendry to call him, now—his new clothes with supple leathers and a thick fur lining about his collar were far warmer and finer than his old traveling clothes.

The sea of people parted to make a path for Gendry, Thonas, and Jon. At the end of it were Lady Cerwyn atop the small flight of stairs leading to the dais, and at the bottom, Arya awaited them in her lady's gown and simply styled hair; simple styles seemed typical for northern noblewomen considering the women around them.

Jon followed behind him and Thonas, urging them forward, and Gendry eyed the people surrounding them. Nobles. The very people he swore to hate with every leech placed on his body years ago. These were the people he cursed for their useless wars and endless need for power. And these were the people he would have to work with for the betterment of Arya's house and lands.

At either side of them, as they made their slow march towards Arya, women and men of all stations in life studied them carefully. Some men looked upon them with uncertainty, while others with an unhidden curiosity. Among the women, their gazes ranged from curious, to lust-filled, to wonder as one would look upon a newborn. But among them all, strangely, none looked upon them with disdain, even though they were lowborns to be knighted into their world.

Their positions would elevate them as equals or higher for many in the room. And as Jon explained to him, his status would give him equal, if not a higher standing than the lords in attendance. He would be their closest thing to a lord of the Great House of the North, even if only temporarily. That thought weighed on him so heavily that he hesitated with each step.

His shoulders felt heavy and slumped as a thought repeated in his head: he'd spent most of his life in Flea Bottom, and some of that in hiding. How was he going to do this? His body shivered as the fear crept up his spine that he would only make matters worse. If they were to rebuild Winterfell, he would be the cause of its destruction this time around, and possibly the death of Arya.

Jon whispered from behind, "She's waiting for you," with an encouraging tone, obviously noticing his hesitation, but it was the small nudge he needed to shift his thoughts from the uncertain future to what he was sure of in the here and now.

His eyes were no longer on the lords and ladies and their servants around him, but on Arya ahead of him. There she stood in all of her beautiful and vibrant glory, and he heard her words in his head. She loved him. She was in love with him. She chose him for more than sharing her bed. He no longer hesitated. The oppressive weight of class and status was all but forgotten as he now had to restrain himself because he wanted so desperately to rush to her, take her in his arms, and hold her close again. Rules of nobility be damned to the Seven Hells. She was his woman. A woman as fiery and wild and beautiful as Arya was truly his.

When the men reached her, Jon whispered in back of them, "kneel," and took his place by Arya's side. Both did as they were told without question.

"Gendry and Thonas, do you swear before the eyes of gods and men to defend those who cannot defend themselves, to protect all women and children, to protect your captains, your liege lady and your Queen, to fight bravely when needed, and do such other tasks that are laid upon you, however hard or humble or dangerous they may be?"

He answered, "I do, m'lady," and heard Thonas answer the same.

Arya stepped forward until she stood directly before Gendry and rested Needle on his shoulder. She moved Needle from his right shoulder to his left and said to him, "Arise, Ser Gendry, knight and castellan of Winterfell." He did, and as was her privilege as a lady, she stepped forward, lifted herself on her toes, and kissed his cheek while whispering "Ser Gendry _my_ Smith." She then kissed his other cheek and whispered, "My bull-headed smith."

Her breath was warm, heated and dripping with her need for him, and Gendry felt his entire body flush with warmth. Unfortunately, there was a warmth and stirring in a place he would rather not have displayed for the lords and ladies around them. It caused the heat to accumulate at the edges of his ears with his embarrassment and wondered how red his skin had gotten. He wondered even more when Jon rolled his eyes and dropped his head, hiding the hint of an amused grin.

She moved on to Thonas and placed Needle at his right shoulder then to his left, "Arise Ser Thonas, knight and Master-at-arms of Winterfell." Thonas stood and turned his head to the side, jutting his jaw in her direction with purpose, and Gendry knew fully what the man expected. Gendry felt his blood begin to boil, but then thought more on the man's actions. The gesture for one had to be done for the other, else his relationship with Arya would be clear to all around them. Arya took a deep breath and kissed both Thonas's cheeks, but before she withdrew, she whispered something to him that made his face ashen.

Although the others around him may have thought that the broad smile across Gendry's face was all due to his new titles, he smiled because he knew Thonas had been reminded of what Arya could do to him when they didn't have witnesses about. He understand why Thonas did what he did, but he didn't have to like it and he didn't want the man to get too comfortable and bold.

"Well, now that that's out'a the way, can we get to business?" an old man with a red face, a strange old and tattered fur for a cloak, and one eye covered with a patch asked Arya. She turned to the Lady Cerwyn and nodded. In turn, the Lady Cerwyn nodded to everyone in attendance. "Let us discuss it, then."

People took seats and stood around the table at the side of the Great Hall, and it seemed to be some pattern as to who sat or stood where. Gendry and Thonas looked at each other and then at the table, completely at a loss as to where they could or should sit until a strong hand grasped Gendry's shoulder hard.

Jon stood in front of them with an unreadable look on his face, and finally motioned his head for them to follow. He spoke in a normal tone, but with so many voices speaking at once, Gendry could barely hear him. "You are the Castellan of Winterfell," he said to Gendry with his head low and barely tilted toward him. He then shifted his head slightly toward Thonas. "And you are the Master-at-arms. Your places in these talks are to always be at her sides and to protect her. Is that clear?" It was a question, but there was only one acceptable answer. "Yes."

Lady Jonella Cerwyn sat at the head of the table, and to her right, Arya sat with many people talking to her at once. Jon reached for Thonas's shoulder and placed him in back of Arya and to her left. For Gendry, he did the same to her right. Where they stood was their place in all of this, and it finally sunk in after watching several servants and most of the noblewomen leave the Great Hall that this was why she had to knight them. This was the only way they could be privy to the conversation.

"You know that Bolton bastard is waiting for you in Winterfell. You go there and your life is forfeit!" the lord with the tattered fur yelled at her, but there was no reaction from Arya, not even a hint of anger. "Like all bastards, legitimized or not, he has no honor. None!" he spat and pounded his fist onto the table as his gaze flicked toward Jon. But they were standing so close, he could have been looking at Gendry.

It happened so quickly no one was prepared for it. Arya scrambled across the table and snatched the man by the collar with Needle at his neck. The Great Hall went silent in an instant and all eyes were on Arya, particularly Needle gripped tightly in her hand. "I'll concede that the Bolton bastard is just as you've said, but if you," she paused and spoke more forcefully with her next words, "or any one of you ever speak of other bastards as such, I will see you outside the bounds of Cerwyn and cut out your tongue. Do we understand each other?"

Behind him, Gendry heard Jon's soft plea, "Arya."

The man didn't shrink from her attack. In fact, he eyed her carefully with his one good eye then nodded. As soon as she released him, Gendry felt the entire room relax as though everyone had been holding their breath the whole time.

"Perhaps you're too wild, even for the north, Lady," said a stocky woman covered in furs. "Do you plan to do to us what you've done with the Freys?"

Arya was already back in her seat returning Needle in its place by the time the woman could finish her sentence. At that, she quirked a brow at the woman, both sizing each other with equal measure while others around them began to look on nervously.

"Do you believe they didn't deserve their fate?" she asked and the woman's eyes softened considerably.

"If that was all it was, then we are in agreement. They deserved their fate."

"What else would it be?"

The woman seemed reluctant to answer, being put on the spot as she was. Finally, she responded with, "To destroy an entire house reeks of ambition, eyes toward the Iron Throne. Westeros is finally at peace and the north can't afford another war."

"All I ask of you, all of you, is to help me restore my house and my family's name," Arya said to all of the lords and ladies, looking each one in the eyes. "Who here will help me?"

Shockingly, the first person to slap their hand on the table with their support was the very man Arya attacked moments ago. "The Umbers are with you, woman! Of those we can scrounge, anyway."

Following him was the woman wrapped in leather and furs, her very large and almost wholly exposed bosom heaved with new excitement. "House Mormont is with you!"

One by one, the lords sitting at the table gave their support except for the Lady Cerwyn. She sat quietly, and it was clear on her face how uncomfortable all of this made her. "I fear for my house," she said sheepishly to the eyes awaiting her allegiance. "I have no man to help protect me here."

The Mormont woman made a snorting sound, making it obvious what she thought of the lady's fear.

Arya seemed to understand the woman's apprehension as she gently reached for her hand. At first, the lady's hand flinched from Arya's reach, but then allowed for her touch. "You've done so much for us as it is, Lady Jonella. Hosting us here has put enough strain and danger upon your home. Stay as neutral as you can until all is done." The warm smile from Arya spread to the lady and that was the end of it.

The conversation flowed from one topic to the next of Northern affairs that were known, heard of, or completely unknown to Gendry. Some were more heated than others, but it wasn't until one man said something that made all ears perk and all tongues stop in mid wag. "You need to find yourself a lord husband and quick, My Lady."

All eyes were on him except for Arya's. This was the moment Gendry dreaded. This was when the parade of suitors would begin, and it was the first step in losing her. The room suddenly felt unbearably hot and unsteady until Thonas patted him on his back reassuringly, bringing him back to what he was supposed to do: stand proudly at Arya's side as her highest servant...yet, still a servant.

"What the hells, I'll make the first offer," the Umber man pounded the table.

Gendry shuddered while everyone else laughed. Although no one took the man's proposal seriously, the man was practically old enough to be her grandfather and then some, which lord's proposal would they take seriously?

Arya forced a smile. To others, it might have even seemed genuine, but Gendry could tell that it wasn't. "Now, now. There's time for that later!" she said to them all in such a jovial, carefree manner, Gendry almost believed she was as at ease as she wanted those around her to believe. "For now, I would rather rebuild Winterfell."

"Wise choice," the Mormont woman agreed. "Keep them dangling until all the men in the north do their part to help you."

The men around them grumbled, but one by one they agreed with the Mormont woman. And with that, Gendry's chest sucked in air that he couldn't manage to breathe only moments before. She would have to choose, but she didn't have to choose at that moment.

"So tell us, is the Imp to be trusted?" asked another man at the far end of the table. "I still chafe at the very thought of a southron lord, a Lannister worst of all, as Warden of the North even if my alternative is Ramsay fucking Bolton." Gendry had heard of the title before, but didn't fully understand the responsibility or position it held. One thing was clear, he was not to become the Warden of the North, and that was a relief.

The people around them began to chatter while nodding their heads in agreement until the volume was so great, one voice was hard to pluck out of the many. It wasn't until Arya started to speak that they quieted.

"He did tell me he was named Warden of the North when my sister returned to him as his lady wife, but he hasn't given me reason to not trust him. Have you not noticed how he has remained silent in your affairs?" she asked while taking the time to look each noble man and woman in the eyes. "He understands fully the damage his family has caused the north and has no desire to possibly cause more, no matter how good his intentions might be."

"Well, I think it's agreed that we won't discuss it further until Winterfell is rebuilt, but I for one will feel more at ease when you are married to a good northern lord. Someone worthy of the mantle! Then get you wedded and bedded and give the North a male heir to settle things once and for all," another lord said, having all the other lords and ladies nodding enthusiastically in agreement again.

They wouldn't let this go. Gendry realized they would never let it go until she did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Comments are how you pay a fanfic author. Feedback is worth its weight in gold._


	20. For Her Honor

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A big thanks to everyone who commented, kudo'd, and/or bookmarked this story.

Talk of the futures of Winterfell and the North waned, giving way to more livelier conversation of rumors and gossip. Servants reentered, and some left the table to mill about the Great Hall. Arya hadn't had time to stand; so many of the lords had come to her to start or join conversation, obviously trying to catch her eye. They had agreed that no one would speak of marriage until after Winterfell was rebuilt, but no one said anything about wooing her until then.

A servant offered Gendry a drink of wine, and he absentmindedly took it from her, sipping as his eyes were locked on the men smiling widely and eying her figure and offering to be of service in one form or another. He didn't notice how the serving woman arched her back to prominently display her ample bosom within his view, or the way her eyes drank in his entire form as she watched him watching Arya.

When it became clear that his attention couldn't be persuaded her way, she took the other goblet full of wine in her hand and moved on to the other newly knighted man in the room who happened to be on his way to Gendry's side. His friend's arm hooked around Gendry's shoulders and pulled him a few steps away from the gathering around Arya. "Snow tells us we can leave her be. That it's time to relax and learn the North."

The man took the goblet from the serving woman with his free hand, and his eyes wandered over the woman's bosom appreciatively. "And I intend to learn _every_ part of the North," he said then leaned in to Gendry, speaking with a softer tone, "and I could get used to this!"

Gendry remained silent.

"They have a decent practice area. Want me to drop you on your arse some to get your mind off of the Lady Assassin?" Thonas whispered.

A small side-grin formed on Gendry's face as he, for the first time, looked away from Arya and her suitors. "I remember you ended a little worse for wear the last time we sparred."

The man beside him laughed. "The one day doesn't count!"

Gendry had almost accepted Thonas's offer until he noticed Jon bend to whisper in Arya's ear. She nodded, said something to the men around her, then followed Jon out of the Great Hall. The last time someone slipped Arya out of a room, things between them grew tense for reasons Gendry still wished he knew but could only guess had to do with his bastardy. Before he could register what he was doing, he quietly released himself from Thonas's hold to leave the Great Hall as well. He heard Thonas warn him not to go, but it didn't fully register in his mind.

By the time he navigated his way through the people and out of the Great Hall and the Keep, he saw the two walking into the enclosed wooded area. He'd heard of a godswood before, but had never been in one. The extent of his knowledge about them was that they were sacred places for those who worshiped the Old Gods. The entrance was nothing more than a gap between two stone walls no taller than his knees, and Gendry couldn't bring himself to cross its threshold. He remembered the lessons of the septas in his youth well, so much so that he began to rub at the back of his hands from the memory. Sacred places were for sacred reasons: worshiping, honoring the dead, and so on. Following a woman he could never have wasn't a sacred reason.

There was no sign of Arya and Jon in the trees, and the cold started to seep into his bones. It felt refreshing at first, but then crept under his skin and into his bones the longer he stayed exposed, and even in his warm, new clothes, they were only slightly warmer than his old clothes with a cloak. The gusts of wind didn't help, only making it seem colder.

He turned to leave the border of the godswood and back to the Keep when he heard something in the wind. It was faint, but he thought it was his name. It whispered again, "Gendry," and it came from the godswood. It didn't sound like Arya or Jon. The hairs on the back of his arms stood on end as he wondered for a heartbeat if the Old Gods were speaking to him directly.

"Gendry," the whispers continued, and he was so curious, he crossed the threshold hesitantly and followed them. Natural sounds went silent in the woods around him as though helping him follow the soft sound of his name. Turning left here, turning right there, he started to hear another voice say his name. This time, it wasn't a whisper, and this time he recognized the voice.

"Gendry's a friend."

"A friend, Arya?" Gendry heard Jon respond, unconvinced.

He saw them in a thicket of trees to his right. Jon sat on the ground resting his back on a tree, and opposite him Arya slumped into the crook of a tree trunk and it's roots, her knees bent in a very unladylike fashion with her gown draped over her legs.

And to his left was a strange tree with a face carved into it. The sap bled red and gave him an uneasy feeling. He'd heard of these trees before, of weirwoods, but seeing one was very different from hearing about it.

"What would you have me say?"

"He would follow you through the Seven Hells and back. I can see it in the way he looks at you. And you'd repay him by getting him killed? " Jon shook his head as though he couldn't believe his own words. "He's a smith? Well then let him find a quiet smithy and a quiet life."

"And a quiet woman?" she asked with her eyebrow cocked and her temper flaring in her voice. "I have my reasons for what I do, brother," she added as she folded her arms across her chest under her cloak.

"And what are those reasons, Arya?"

Arya's lips parted and then opened fully as though she were going to say something, but there was no sound. Gendry pushed himself closer to the tree he'd been hiding behind, but Arya closed her mouth and remained silent.

"Gendry is important to me, and he will be important to Winterfell. You'll see, brother," was all she said after that.

Jon shifted in his cloak, and the slight movement only reminded Gendry of how cold he'd become. There was parchment pulled from the tie of his breeches, and Jon passed it to Arya. "Here's the letter from Tyrion you expected. I never let the maester out of my sight until it arrived. All but slept in his bed to be sure no one else would have it."

She took the rolled parchment, broke the seal and began to read it quickly. It only took her moments before she rolled it back up and stuffed it deep in her bosom.

"So why aren't you at Castle Black? You were Lord Commander last I'd heard," Arya asked him.

He nodded then his eyes shot upward as though he saw something in the sky. Gendry followed his line of sight and saw nothing. His jaw clenched and all of his muscles seemed to tense simultaneously. "That ended with my death."

"Your death? You're right here!" she argued. She seemed offended that he would even say something so laughable, and Gendry even had to suppress a chuckle. Any amusement they had ended when he asked, "Have you heard what happened with your mother? Have you seen her?"

Jon didn't wait for her answer; he simply pulled back his cloak and lifted his tunic, revealing stab wounds covering the entire middle of his body. As many as there were and as deep as they seemed to be, the man, by all rights, should have been dead. Arya's breath caught in her chest and her reply was weak and childlike as though dreading what his next words to her would be, "Yes, I've heard, but I haven't seen her. I've seen it done on another, though."

"Melisandre did the same. She saw the handiwork of a red priest among the Brotherhood and decided to try on me. I died, and so ended my Watch. But unlike most, I came back."

Arya wiped her eyes with the back of her hand roughly and sniffed. From Gendry's vantage, he couldn't see her face, but when the back of her hand rubbed at her eye again and then the other, he knew she was losing a battle with her tears.

Gendry suddenly felt how private the moment was and how intrusive he'd been. Brother and sister were finally reunited after so many years, having to discuss all of the good and bad that's passed through their lives, and he wouldn't let them be, let her be. He turned and retraced his steps back to the edge of the godswood and headed for the Keep.

Inside, Thonas welcomed him with a hearty slap to his back and introduced him to some of the noblemen Thonas had already befriended. The Umber man was among them—Thonas said his name was Mors—and Gendry had to admit to himself that the man wasn't bad company when he wasn't proposing marriage to Arya.

* * *

The smell of the evening meal being prepared in the kitchens wafted into the Great Hall and Gendry's stomach began to rumble, distracting him from his game with the men around him. Thonas and Mors took it upon themselves to teach Gendry how to play; Thonas far more eager since he had tried several times before with a very unwilling and unresponsive Gendry in Flea Bottom.

And as they thought it best, he was learning it the hard way. Having already sloshed through six cups of ale—it could have been twenty with his count lost—since his return from the godswood, the faces of the men were starting to blur and his chair was starting to wobble. It didn't matter because the men around him laughed heartily as they played another round.

Gendry slammed his cup down on the table, and for the first time he was the first to do it. Mors looked around the table with his good eye and bellowed a hearty laugh. Thonas laughed as well, but also wheezed out, "There has to be a first time for everything!"

Suddenly, the entire table descended into a fit of laughter that forced Gendry to grin. His grin widened into a full smile, and before he knew it, he was laughing with them. And as the drink dulled his senses and his thoughts grew fuzzy, he had to admit that he was beginning to like these Northern noblemen.

It also helped that his mind was too foggy to think about Arya. That was the beauty of drinking: the mind dulled to where he could only have one thought in his head at a time, and at this time, he was surrounded by several Thonas-like men hell-bent on having the time of their lives. As though to prove his point, Thonas grabbed the serving woman from earlier as she passed by, and pulled her down to his lap. She chuckled and welcomed his attention with a warm smile.

One of the men at the table, tongue far too loose from far too much ale and wine, chuckled and muttered, "I'd like to have Lady Stark across my lap…or in my bed. Did you see the curve of her—"

The man was of noble birth, but Gendry couldn't remember his name. At the moment, he didn't want to remember his name. All he could do was stare at him and wish him dead. Gendry's hands felt tight and ached, and he heard a buzzing in his ears that he could only guess was the result of his blood rushing to them. A small nudge at his elbow distracted him from his focus on the man, and he looked to his side to see Thonas eying him nervously. He looked down to suddenly see his shortsword in one hand and his warhammer in the other, both gripped so tightly that his knuckles were starting to whiten.

Around him, men were quiet and staring at him warily, and down the small flight of steps was the wooden table tipped on it's side. It was a very long, heavy table. How did it get moved and tipped?

"What's going on here?" he heard Arya ask from behind him, and he twisted his body to see her and Jon standing by the entrance of the Great Hall.

"Your castellan's gone mad!" the man said, and Gendry returned his focus to him. Only able to focus on one thought at a time, this time it was shame that flooded him. Had he embarrassed her as castellan already?

"You made a lewd remark about his Liege Lady, and right in front of him, you idiot," Mors grumbled, then his gaze slid to Gendry and gave him a nod. "No one can fault him for defending her honor."

"Ser Thonas," Arya said softly as he heard her stepping closer behind him, "please take Ser Gendry to his chambers. I believe he's well in his cups and needs to sleep it off. When he's of his own mind again, tell him my honor thanks him."

He turned back to straighten his body and his head dipped low. Gendry could barely bring himself to look up from his shoes, and it was only when chuckles spread around him he did. The first thing he noticed was that the men around him were no longer tense and the man that was his focus now carried the look of shame. Thonas nudged him on the shoulder to get him to move toward the corridor that would lead to his room.

"And as for you, Ser Artos…" was all that Gendry heard from Arya before they left the Great Hall.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Feed a muse. Leave a comment._


	21. Look for the Deeper Meaning

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A big thanks to everyone who commented, kudo'd, and/or bookmarked this story.

The sound of a soft click roused Gendry from his hard sleep. He'd had too much wine…or ale…or both, and as soon as Thonas dropped him on his bed, he couldn't remember anything but the oblivion of sleep. It was nighttime, but there was no light coming from his window, and he was sure he's missed the evening meal.

His door opened with a whiny creak and then there was the soft pattering of feet followed by the door creaking closed. Someone lit the candle in the sconce nearest the door, and the back of Gendry's eyes burned and rejected it no matter how curious he was to see who entered.

There were sounds of light metal on wood, more footsteps, and a chair sliding across the floor.

He turned and squinted, barely making out the shapes of two forms moving about. As his sight came into focus, he saw Arya sitting in a chair that had been moved closer to the bed, with Rellie in back of her spreading out small plates of food.

"You missed the evening meal, stupid bull," she said to him. It wasn't kind, but kind wasn't Arya. At least, rarely Arya. What had happened before he was brought to his room came back to him like a flood, and he winced when he remembered standing in front of the noblemen, armed. Was she angry with him? No, the mirth in her voice was sign enough that she was more amused with him than annoyed or angry.

"I think it was for the best, m'lady high," he said, emphasizing the last bit to match her gibe.

Rellie silently slipped between them to offer Gendry a plate of meat and bread. He struggled to sit up, his muscles protesting and his head pounding, and accepted it. She then curtsied and walked away to do something with the remaining plates.

Hungry, he shoveled the food into his mouth and some of it caught in his dry throat and stuck to the roof of his dry mouth. He coughed and tried to clear his throat, but there was no moisture to do it. He was suffering well for his overindulgence of wine and ale.

Arya leaned forward and offered him a cup he hadn't noticed she was holding. It was water, and it helped.

"Thonas told me what you did with the table. He says the men still talk of how you flung it down the stairs as though it were nothing more than a child's chair. Seems you've gained some respect among them," she said with her gaze on him, watching for his reaction.

He'd seen the thing tipped on its side down the stairs, but he didn't realize he was the cause…alone. He was strong, a fact that he'd been reminded of for so long, but that table was large and very heavy. Prickly heat soared from his neck to his cheeks and the tips of his ears. "I'm sorry if I embarrassed you, already."

Her eyes softened considerably, almost lovingly. Her hand lifted from her lap and moved toward him slowly before Rellie came between them again with another plate of food, taking his empty one away. Arya's hand dropped back to her lap, and the softening in her eyes faded just as quickly. It was only then he noticed that she no longer wore the lady's gown but a silk tunic with leather breeches and leather boots. Her hair was not styled in a lady's fashion, but with the top half pulled back into a leather thong as she'd done during their early travels.

"We have to leave for Winterfell early tomorrow morn."

"What is it, Arya? You've been rushing our steps from the moment you spoke with that half-lord."

For a heartbeat, her brows dipped down, but then she regained her composure. It was enough for him to know she didn't like his name for the Lord Lannister.

"Can you read?" she asked him, and the question was like a hit to the gut.

It was a valid question. Many in Flea Bottom couldn't. As the apprentice of an armorer, he had to learn. If most of your patrons were going to be noblemen, it was almost a necessity. Still, the question from Arya's lips made him wince before he nodded.

She held out a piece of parchment, the very one Jon had given her. The two sides of the seal were still on the end and center back of the scroll and together, they formed the image of a lion. Gendry unrolled it and took in the handwriting as a whole. It was hard to read at first, being so long since he'd put the knowledge to use, but he made out the words slowly.

_I hope this letter finds you well, good sister. You've traveled quite a distance without  
a wheelhouse, and I fear the journey may have taken it's toll on your health. _

_King's Landing is just as I remember. A month here is very much like eternity. The_  
wedding was a lovely affair, with our new king still having misplaced his mirth. As for  
our queen, sadly, her disposition has not been as cool and refreshing as it has been  
since the grey stones crumbled in the courtyard. Her Grace is none too pleased. She  
fears the ever increasing number of wolves will breach her secure haven. They have  
grown restless as winter leaves us, but I've assured her that the wolves have no taste  
for those in the Keep with our bones gristly and flesh tainted from politics. 

_I've spoke of you often, my recently returned good sister, to Her Grace. She is eager to_  
meet with you. It is only a matter of time before her curiosity becomes unbearable, and  
she insists on a meeting. A dragon meeting a direwolf? That is a sight I would not miss  
seeing with my own two eyes.

 _I should also inform you of our king's newly found appreciation of extended family and_  
his position as uncle for our mutual acquaintance. He extends his well wishes and  
invitation to King's Landing. 

_Otherwise, all is as it should be, and I wish you fruitful endeavors, good sister._

_Lord Tyrion Lannister of Casterly Rock_

There was nothing he could see in the letter that would warrant the agitation Arya felt, making her so eager to leave for Winterfell. The half-lord only spoke of weddings and gardens and little, useless bits of information about the queen and king. What was written about Stannis Baratheon made him uneasy, but was nothing that put them in immediate danger.

"There's more to the letter than that, Gendry. Look closer, for a deeper meaning," she said to him when she noticed his confusion.

It took three times to reread the letter, but the meaning started to change when he realized Tyrion may have known what Arya was going to do to the Freys. Suddenly, the true meaning wasn't so hidden on his fourth reading.

The journey would take it's toll on her health because her intention to kill an entire house alone would leave most bloodied, and perhaps broken. The queen upset over the crumbed stones…

The Freys. The queen heard what had happened with the Freys and isn't pleased at all. In fact, if Gendry gleaned the true meaning correctly, she feared Arya had her eye on the Iron Throne, much the way the Mormont woman had believed. Eager to meet…

"She'll demand to see you," he said to her as he looked up from the letter. Arya nodded and replied, "In two month's time. We have to be ready."

The fear tingled up his spine, and he had to ask, "Ready for what?"

" _Meeting_ the queen…and king."

* * *

The ride north was a brutal journey, even only a half day's ride. Although Northern Westeros was colder than Southern Westeros, it had grow increasingly colder for the last day and a half. To make matters worse, they started their ride before the sun rose fully, before it had the chance to warm their bones to begin their travels.

Gendry released the reins with one hand to push back his hair that had fallen over his forehead and into his eyes, annoyed with the wind that constantly blew to the side of him. At his other side, Arya rode the blood bay destrier, a "gift" from Artos Flint, with some excitement in her posture. She leaned forward into the wind and closed her eyes, allowing her horse to walk without her guidance. Her hair whipped at her face and her cloak was fully opened by the wind.

"M'lady, you'll catch your death if you don't close your cloak," he said to her, trying not to be heard by any of the men accompanying them. At the other side of her was Thonas, seemingly just as annoyed with the cold, constantly blowing into his cupped free hand for warmth.

Mors and two of his men rode ahead of them, and in back of them, Jon manned the cart while Ser Artos Flint and his men followed close behind. Even with the distance between them, Gendry could sense the Flint man's eyes on Arya. They were always on Arya. At least with all that had happened the night before, he'd learned to control his tongue and speak of her with nothing but the utmost respect, especially in Gendry's presence.

A distance ahead Winterfell was within view, but several men stood midway between them and the castle, some on horseback and some on foot. They didn't seem like a friendly lot. In fact, the way they waited for them reminded Gendry of the men on the Kingsroad.

The men on horses cantered toward them while those on foot began to walk at a very casual pace. Mors stopped his horse and gave the signal for his men to do the same. "My lady," Mors called back, "stay close. They have more men than we do."

There was one man ahead of the others, and he stopped his horse in front of Mors, the rest of the rough looking lot on horseback stopped in back of him. "I've heard the real Arya Stark has returned, and I've come to Winterfell for a glimpse," the man said as he focused his gaze on Arya, where it lingered a little too long. And his eyes unsettled Gendry the most. They were wild and murderous. Not in the way he'd seen in Arya's eyes, but in a way he'd seen in other killers, killers who took pleasure in each death they dealt.

"Well, you've had more than a glimpse of me, Lord Bolton," Arya said, sliding off the side of her horse, walking slowly towards him with her hands pulling her cloak closed around her. Mors was about to react, say something or do something, but Gendry signaled his horse to walk forward beside the man to get his attention. Surprised by his sudden appearance, Mors looked at Gendry who gave him a shake of his head, telling him to do nothing.

He didn't like it any more than Mors, the man's displeasure evident in his hard one-eyed gaze, but Arya knew the danger, and she never acted without her reasons. The problem was, Gendry never knew her reasons until they were seen to their end.

"And I shall have a better look at you when you're my wife," said Lord Bolton as his lips stretched into a grin that looked more like a sneer. Behind Gendry, there was a choking sound from the Flint man that Gendry had all but forgotten.

Arya stepped around Lord Bolton and his horse while keeping her eyes locked to him, watching his every move. "Haven't you bedded enough Aryas my lord. Two, I've heard, or were there more? Either way, I would have thought you'd have had your fill."

The man's smile faltered for a heartbeat, but he seemed determined to continue his casual, friendly facade. "From what I can tell, the best one awaits me, yet," he said to her with his voice lower and his eyes darker and his back bowed toward her more menacingly. In turn, she took one step away from him, still watching him carefully.

"Well, it has been decided that I will not choose a husband until Winterfell is rebuilt to its former glory."

"My lady," he began as he shook his head, "that won't do. I've come this far for my wife, my rightful wife, and I intend to have her."

Arya took a step toward Lord Bolton, and Mors shifted on his horse as though he was going to dismount. Arya gave Gendry a pointed look, a look he knew as "do nothing" reinforcing his belief that she had a plan. In turn, Gendry called to Mors, mustering as much authority in his voice as he could, and eyed him pointedly. The old man understood the meaning and settled on his horse once more.

Lord Bolton watched the exchanged, then focused on Arya once more.

"So, where were we?

Arya smiled at him. "I was about to tell you, you should take your men and leave Winterfell quickly, my lord."

The lord was about to respond, seemingly amused by their exchange when the wind suddenly stopped and a howl pierced the silence in a way that only seemed to magnify it. It unnerved every single person except Arya, who closed her eyes and swayed as though thinking of a melody. The howl was joined by another, then another until Gendry lost count of the voices in the chorus.

When it stopped, what followed was a rumbling, a sound or a feeling Gendry couldn't tell, but it was there and it grew in its strength with each heartbeat.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _When you leave a comment, a fanfic fairy gets her wings._


	22. Remains in Winterfell

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A big thanks to everyone who commented, kudo'd, and/or bookmarked this story.

The rumbling unnerved all of the men and the Lord Bolton's calm demeanor slipped while his men looked on him nervously, hoping for a sign from him, for some direction as to what they should do or expect.

The rumbling stopped abruptly, and that's when Arya opened her eyes, focused hard on Lord Bolton and said one word, "Leave."

"I will not!" Lord Bolton shouted with spittle flying and his face reddening as he hopped off of his horse.

Nymeria was the first to appear at the edge of the woods, followed by Ghost. Both had their hackles up and their teeth bared until Nymeria lifted her head and howled. This time in response, smaller wolves bounded from the cover of the trees toward them and the rumbling began again. All of the men reached for their swords, Mors and Artos's men as well.

By all rights, he should have reached for his warhammer and shortsword as well, it was madness not to, but this was Arya's wolf. The woman and wolf shared a bond that Gendry couldn't fully understand, but he knew it was there.

"Stay your swords," Gendry told them, trying to sound like the castellan he was supposed to be. "They're not for you."

Lord Bolton's eyes grew wider at the sight of hundreds of wolves descending upon them, and he reached for Arya, locking his arm around her neck and holding a dagger at her throat with his other hand. "Call them off. Call them off or I swear I'll kill you before they ever reach us."

Arya's first reaction was a laugh, a full throated laugh. "Oh, sweet Lord Bolton, if I die this day, they will follow you, and they will not stop. They will tear through each of your men until they kill you. Leave, and save your hide."

Gendry saw the wild look in his eyes, but this time it was panic. They were not ready for the onslaught of hundreds of wolves. Lord Bolton threw Arya to the ground and rushed for a nearby horse. With his frustration and rage, he motioned for his men to follow, but no one could miss the murderous look in his eyes toward Arya right before he turned his horse to the east and rode away, his men following close behind him. Those only a small distance away without horses started to run for their lives. Many didn't make it. A running man was never a match for a running wolf.

As though the events of what had just happened weren't strange enough, the farther they disappeared in the distance, the weaker the wind had become until it was nothing more than an occasional breeze. It was as though the wind knew the danger had passed.

With the immediate danger gone, Gendry rushed to Arya's side and held out his hand to help her stand while the rest of the stampede of wolves rushed past them, nipping at the flanks of Lord Bolton's horses. "How did you manage this one, my lady?" Gendry asked her.

"Didn't you ever wonder where Nymeria went when she left us during the day?"

He never thought about where the wolf went, always assuming that she was just being a wolf: scouting, hunting, running. But now he remembered the times she left during their travels. How she and Arya disappeared almost every morning.

"Nymeria has a pack of her own. She brought them north with us, absorbing other packs as they went."

Arya watched the sea of wolves chase the men on horseback while Gendry watched her.

* * *

They reached the gates of Winterfell and Arya slid off of her horse, wide-eyed in disbelief at the woeful state of the castle and its grounds.

The gates were rebuilt, but they were of poor workmanship, and inside the Keep, the Great Hall was covered in dark tapestries that depicted flayed men and other tortures. Arya's tears no longer fell, but a darkness came across her face.

She began tearing tapestries down, screaming…growling as she did so, shredding them with Needle. The men gathered in the Great Hall, silently watching her. That was all they could do, as Gendry was sure they were too afraid to approach her with her temper high and Needle in hand.

After the tapestries were nothing more than ribbons on the floor, Jon spoke up. "Gendry, please escort the Lady Stark to her chambers. She knows the way."

Gendry nodded and grabbed a weary Arya who was kneeling on top of what was left of the last tapestry she'd torn down. She leaned back, and he pulled her up to stand with him. She needed his support, giving him a reason to hold her close to him as he wanted to do, even with witnesses about. He whispered in her ear, "We'll make it what it was."

She nodded and fell into his arms as they walked, nudging him in the direction they had to go. Once they reached Arya's chambers, a small room that wasn't heavily decorated or extravagant, Gendry couldn't help but remind himself that this was her childhood room. This was the room of the Arya before.

As she walked in, she turned to see if he followed, but he didn't. He stood at the threshold of her door his hands locked before him and his head down. Where they were only pressed more upon him that she was a lady, that she was his liege lady, and all he could think to do was assume the stance one would in the presence of nobility.

Arya sighed wearily. "You are no longer a man without a title, Gendry. No more standing that way. Chin up," she said then waited for him to do so. "And your hands should be at your sides or behind you. If they rest in front of you, you should have a good reason for it."

He unclasped his hands and let them drop to his sides.

"Now, come into my room."

If anyone were to see him enter her chambers alone, Gendry was sure the result wouldn't be far from the North descending into the Seven Hells. She knew this as well, but when he hesitated, it didn't stop Arya's brows from dipping down in anger. Every part of him knew that it was a mistake, but he crossed the threshold regardless.

She closed the door behind him, and before he had a chance to speak, her hands were at the ties of her breeches. He tried to stay her hands, but she slapped them away to undo the tie fully. They fell to her ankles, and Arya stepped out of them; her tunic hung fully, the hem of her tunic against her upper thigh.

She continued to move, stepping around him then carefully backwards until the backs of her legs were against her bed. She sat down on it, and her eyes reflected the light from the window to the side of them, glistening more than usual. She raised her hands to him. "I need you, Gendry."

He knelt before her as she parted her legs for him.

At first, he couldn't rouse his cock for her, so very aware of the ghost in this room, the ghost of what was and what could have been. He rested the side of his head against her thigh, thinking of the headstrong young girl innocent of what was to become of her and her family.

Her fingers slid along his scalp, his hair between her fingers, and his thoughts were brought back to the present. He thought about the woman before him. His woman. And she needed his reassurance of some stability.

The Seven knew he needed some stability at the moment, and he always found his firm ground, his foundation in her arms and deep inside her. Perhaps she found the same. He looked up and into her eyes, and watched one tear wrestle its way free. "You have me," he said to her before he lifted himself enough to kiss her, leaning her back on the old, dusty furs covering her bed.

"You will always have me," he said as he untied his breeches with one hand while hovering over her supported by his other arm. Arya's frenzied fingers helped him pull them down just enough. He used his newly freed hand to tilt her hips up to meet his and entered her slowly, savoring the feel of her. As she held on to him tightly and their bodies moved with that familiar rhythm, there was a sense that they were whole again, and Gendry knew they were, at last, home.

* * *

He left Arya in her room asleep, but the sun still shone through her window which only made him restless. There was so much to do, so much to repair and rebuild that Gendry was starting to feel that weight of it on his shoulders and the back of his neck. The first of the attacks had been thwarted. Nymeria, with the help of Ghost and her wolfpack, had seen to that, but there would be more. It was in the Lord Bolton's eyes.

Outside the Keep, the wolves were everywhere, doing everything wolves do: sleeping, laying, walking, eating. Winterfell had become a wolf haven. Mors and Flint's men were still wary of them, but they no longer had to keep their eyes on them at all times, waiting for an attack from the wild beasts that never came as the rest of the day had come and gone. The creatures hadn't so much as noticed the men.

Gendry walked to what looked to be a forge. It couldn't be called a smithy because what was left of the structure around it was little more than a lean-to. The forge was in a decent state, although a little neglected, and Gendry inventoried what was left of the tools. Many were there or a substitute could be found like a good slack tub, but there were some tools that could not be made easily or substituted like the fuller and hardy.

With a sigh, Gendry studied the nicks and groves on the anvil. They all told a story, and this one was no different. It had been there when Arya's family was still whole, and it was there when her family was scattered across Westeros.

"I've sent one of Artos's men back to Cerwyn to tell her we've arrived…safely," said a voice behind him. Jon's voice.

"Good," Gendry said as he picked up the tongs, opening and closing them to get a feel for this pair. "We'll need to be able to speak with her regularly," he said as he returned the tongs back to their place.

"This is where I had Needle forged for her. The smith's name was Mikken."

"Mikken," Gendry repeated. He would honor the man for his work, wherever the man was or whatever had become of him.

"She must move into her parents' chambers. She's the Lady of Winterfell, now, and you can't allow her to stay in her room and cling to the past." Gendry still didn't turn and look back at her half-brother, guilt for what they had done in her childhood room seeping out of him in sweat.

"I know full well what's between you and Arya."

The guilt only increased, and Gendry had to turn and face Arya's half-brother, else he would be nothing but a coward. To his surprise, Jon smiled a sad smile. "Her father would'n't have known whether to be furious or laugh. I've felt that the same way."

Jon's words bothered Gendry, but one portion of it bothered him more. " _Her_ father?"

"Yes," Jon said as he took steps around the lean-to. "Arya's not my sister, my half-sister. She's my cousin. I've only learned of this fairly recently myself…told to me by my other cousin."

None of it made sense to Gendry, and Jon must have understood that because he shook his head and chuckled softly. "I wasn't Ned Stark's bastard. I was his sister's bastard. I'm sure you've heard the story of Lady Lyanna?"

Gendry had heard it, the reason for Robert's Rebellion, so he nodded.

"Well, she was my mother, hidden long enough to see me into this world, but not much more. A Baratheon and a Stark were the cause of war. I can only hope that when a Baratheon and a Stark can be the force for peace."

He tried to understand. Was Jon, actually Arya's cousin, giving Gendry his acceptance? Even if he were, it wasn't enough. "We cannot be together. The Northern nobility wouldn't accept it."

"You'd be surprised what the North will accept under the right leadership," Jon said to him then turned to walk away. "Besides, Arya has a plan for you."

At that, Gendry wondered if the man planned to give him some hint of what Arya had in store for him, but Jon only continued to walk away. Gendry called out to him, hoping he would stop. "You know what she has planned?"

Jon stopped and turned back to face him, nodding. "Some. I hope you're ready for what awaits you, Ser Gendry, because you will have to be, or Winterfell and the North are lost." After that, Jon started to walk away again when Gendry called to him once more. "You said your other cousin. Which of Arya's brothers still lives?"

"You've already met him," Jon said without stopping, continuing to walk away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Fanfic authors live on caffeine and comment. Please help feed a fanfic author today!_


	23. Call to Arms

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A big thanks to everyone who commented, kudo'd, and/or bookmarked this story.

The North seemed to breathe a sigh of relief to have a Stark in Winterfell again; the news of what had happened with the Lord Bolton only helped bolster the ladyship of Arya within it. And when the smallfolk flowed into its walls like a river, Rellie and Maester Roebin were among them, having traveled from Cerwyn castle.

Arya had requested Rellie as her lady’s maid, and for the life of him, Gendry couldn’t understand the attachment. The girl was quiet and unassuming, always desperate to be unseen with her head bowed low and her curled, rich brown hair curtaining her face and always following quietly behind her lady.

And Arya. It had been less than a turn of the moon since her cousin, once thought her half-brother, left for The Gift and the wildlings settled within it. A part of Arya seemed to go with him, and a distance had wedged between her and Gendry. He felt it keenly when they were together, only for their meals, only when she listened to the people’s grievances with him standing beside her as her castellan.

Otherwise, she would stay within the confines of the Keep, quietly wrapped in her fur cloak for comfort and brows furrowed deep in her thoughts with Rellie at her heels or by her side.

There were times when Nymeria emerged from the Wolfswood, her pack having returned to their wild home, and Arya would venture outside. The two would walk into the godswood, lady and wolf, and it was Arya’s assurance of the direwolf’s wellbeing as the pups in her belly began to show.

As though to prove even more that she was not herself, Arya began what he thought she never would. Ever. She started a gathering for all women in Winterfell in needlework. They gathered in the early morn, and when they dispersed before midday, the women chirped and chattered with giddy excitement.

Needlework. She was slipping from him, becoming the lady he feared she would have to become, the lady he could no longer secretly call his. He knew what would come next: accepting some lord’s proposal of marriage, aligning her house to another for strength. A practical, lady thing to do.

The fear of losing her fueled his frustration, and he could only find his release in something familiar. With all the strength it provided, Gendry hit the steel he’d been shaping with the hammer. It felt good in his hands. He hadn’t realized how he missed the clank of metal against metal, the heat, and the focus needed until he worked that first attempt at a helm. It was a horrible thing, and had to be melted down for a new start. This try was far better.

“Sloppy. You’re better than that piece of shit,” a man’s voice said from behind him, critiquing his work.

Gendry knew that voice, and spun around to see a man he hadn’t seen for what seemed like a lifetime. Tobho Mott. He narrowed his eyes, wondering why and how the man stood before him.

The man lifted a long bundle and laid it on the table nearby. “Lord Lannister sent me to complete your apprenticeship.”

There were certainly techniques Gendry didn’t know, but it wasn’t anything he couldn’t learn on his own. He was about to tell the man as much when Tobho Mott unwrapped what were two swords made of a peculiar steel. He’d seen this metal before in passing but had never been this close.

“You’re going to learn how to forge Valyrian steel, bo…Gen…Ser Gendry,” the man corrected himself, realizing he could no longer call Gendry a boy and that he did have a title. “Very few people have this knowledge. I was to teach you, but there was no time,” he chose to say, the last with a hint of regret.

“What are we going to make with these?” Gendry asked as his fingers felt along the flat of one of the swords. Tobho Mott answered with renewed vigor and excitement. “They were made from a sword that should never have been reforged. So we’re going to set things right for Lady Stark.”

* * *

The fires had to be hotter to reforge Valyrian steel than other metals, which was why Master Mott preferred they work late at night and into the early morn before the sun had time to rise.

All doors and windows of the newly built smithy were closed to hold within it the carefully guarded secret. Gendry watched as the metal didn’t turn red hot like other metals, but rippled and glowed blue as he shaped it with a smith’s hammer that was much larger than he’d had ever seen. Once in the rough shape he wanted, he whispered words he didn’t understand that Master Mott told him to memorize. The blue tint rippling along the blade froze in place, creating the effect in the metal. As it cooled, the blue disappeared but the rippling remained.

There was more, finer shaping to be done now that the two swords had been melted together into one roughly shaped piece, but the sun was coming up, and Master Mott told him that they would continue that night.

Gendry’s shoulders ached and his back was sore as he walked toward the Keep from the Forge, ready for his room and his bed. There were men about without a woman in sight which meant Arya's needlework gathering had not ended yet.

Just before he reached the doors to the Keep, Thonas met and grabbed him by his arm, pulling him to the newly built practice grounds with a hearty laugh. Mors, Artos and their men were already there talking amongst themselves.

“Who’s first to teach the castellan a lesson?” Thonas asked loudly, and then gave Gendry a wink before whispering, "Artos knows your strength, but thinks your skill with a warhammer must be shit with no practice or training."

Artos grabbed a wooden sword, swung it to get a feel for the weight, and waited. His friend shoved him toward the fence of the practice ground muttering, "I have coin on this!" Even though he was tired and wanted his bed more than a good sparring match, Gendry could do nothing but accept the challenge with so many expectant eyes and grinning faces on him. He chuckled to himself as she strode over and reached for the wooden warhammer. Thonas touted his skill with the warhammer, but Gendry was just good enough not to get killed. He hoped, in this match, he could at least keep his dignity.

The men around them whooped and hollered as the two men circled each other with friendly smiles, sizing the other for their sparring match. Artos was the first to attack, but it was a simple move Gendry sidestepped easily. In response, Gendry swung his warhammer and missed as well. The match had gone on like this for some time, and the onlookers grew weary of what turned out to be a very uninterestingly tentative match.

Suddenly, the friendly smile dropped from Artos’s face as he swung his sword hard against Gendry’s arm; the wood would definitely leave a heavy bruise. He hadn’t expected the shift in tactic, and as the man swung at him again with more fervor than the last, he wondered what caused the change. As they continued to circle each other, Gendry finally saw what Artos had only moments ago. Arya was watching, no longer among the women and their needlework.

His arm hurt, but it was nothing compared to the anger welling inside him that the man tried to use Gendry to elevate himself in the eyes of Arya. Gendry lunged forward, roaring in anger and frustration and confusion and all of those feelings that Arya conjured in him as he swung his wooden warhammer at the man.

Artos escaped it with ease, but not the next swing, or the one after that. Gendry swung until Artos’s back was on the ground and the wooden sword shattered against the warhammer which lost its hammerhead, snapping free and skidding across the grounds. He threw what remained of his warhammer to the side and hunched over the man, ready to attack with his fists.

“Gendry!” he heard beyond the pounding of his blood in his ears.

He looked up to see Arya eyes focused hard on him. “Bull-headed smith,” she muttered. “Follow me.”

Arya gave Rellie, ever at her heels, a look and in turn the girl nodded in silent agreement before Arya started towards the godswood. Gendry straightened his body and followed Arya quietly. There was some relief with the cover of trees separating them from the eyes of the practice grounds, but he still feared what Arya had in store for him as she slipped throught he woods soundlessly. He was not to light of foot.

She stopped at the weirwood and turned to face him. “Control your anger, Gendry.”

“As soon as Winterfell is restored fully, Artos will offer marriage,” he said to her, ignoring what she’d said to him, going straight to what was bothering him. He had to confront her, his last shred of hope that she could be his for a little longer dangling from it.

“I know,” she said as she turned her head away from him.

Even in the godswood in the cover of trees, there could always be eyes watching, someone out there to find them. Even so, he was desperate, and desperate men do desperate things. He grabbed her arms and pulled her close to him, and he barely had her body against his before she shoved him away, breaking his hold on her.

She wasn’t angry, but she did seem annoyed. “Will he be the one you will marry, Arya?”

Her eyes dipped down to her feet as though she couldn’t level her eyes with his, but then they raised. “That is something you needn’t concern yourself with.”

The pounding of his heart seemed to stop just as his breath caught in his throat. He felt his thoughts scatter, too many and too quick to hold on to one, and that familiar pang of despair crept into his chest. Fearful that he would close himself from the world again like he'd done in Flea Bottom, he chose a different direction in their conversation.

“I know Jon’s not your brother.”

Arya nodded and sat in the crook of the weirwood’s roots, “I will always love him like a brother, but he’s my cousin. The only brother I have left is…” She stopped to nestle herself into the weirwood as though looking for comfort, “close.”

“Why won’t he come back? He can be the Lord of Winterfell and you could be free.” It was a selfish thing to ask, to hope for, but it was all the hope he had left.

“Bran’s path is connected to all of this, but not as the Lord of Winterfell,” she said sadly. “Gendry, I—”

“My Lady!” a balding maester interrupted as he ran towards them as well as he could with those metal links chained about his neck and his face reddening by the moment. He stopped closer to Arya, huffing and puffing for his breath, but spoke to both between wheezes.

“Ravens, my lady! Deepwood Motte has found wolf carcasses in the Wolfswood.”

At that, there was no surprise from Arya. She merely pulled her cloak a little tighter about her shoulders.

“And the Hornwood has been attacked!” At that, Arya pulled herself up from the tree’s roots and stood with the maester. “Ramsay Bolton left it in the care of Wyman Manderly when he assumed lordship over the Dreadfort after his father’s…death. But after what had happened with you, my lady, Manderly refused Bolton’s call to arms against Winterfell and paid with his life.”

Arya was already walking to leave the godswood with the maester when he heard her tell him to gather Thonas, Artos and Mors in the Great Hall. Gendry was about to follow when he felt a breeze against his skin and a sound with it.

It was such a light sound that he thought to ignore it until it whispered again, “Gendry.” It called to him from the other side of the weirwood. He followed that voice, the very one he’d heard in Cerwyn’s godswood. The sound seemed to come from the ancient tree with its solemnly carved face and dried sap as red as blood seeping from it corners.

His name sounded from the tree, and Gendry touched the face to assure himself that they thing was not alive. His finger touched the hardened sap and his vision blurred, his thoughts fogged as the forest around the weirwood jittered out of focus, settling until he was surrounded by another woodland.

“Gendry.” This time the voice was clearer, not on the wind but in back of him. The pool of water near the weirwood was no longer behind him, but there was someone standing on the bare forest floor. The man smiled at him, his auburn hair very red in the sunlight and his blue eyes steady. He was not a man grown but close to it if Gendry could guess.

“We don’t have much time,” he said he turned to look at something to Gendry’s right where it was no longer trees but the inside of a dwelling that jarred an almost forgotten memory. A man and woman were tangled beneath a blanket and parted with heavy breaths.

“Woman, you’ll be the death of me,” said a man that had a similar look of his uncle, but far more handsome and far less dour. He had black hair and striking blue eyes, and this man laughed a deep rumbling laugh with little care.

“You flatter me, Your Grace,” the woman with golden hair said as she slipped from the bed and the cover of the blanket. It was his mother. He could barely remember her face, but seeing it clearly now, he recognized her immediately.

Gendry’s first reaction was to turn away, not relishing the prospect of seeing his mother that way, until he noticed the slight swell of her stomach. “You spend so much time here, I would almost think you have more of an interest in me than was happens in the bed,” she laughed as she dipped a cloth into a basin and squeezed the water over her shoulder.

The man Gendry was sure was Robert Baratheon folded his arms in back of his head while watching his mother.

“You're a good woman. You shouldn't have to stay here, but my new wife’s a jealous wench. Even so, that babe in your belly’ll never want for anything.”

The woman’s head dipped down to look at her belly as she rubbed it lovingly.

To Gendry’s right, he heard a soft voice singing sweetly. He turned to see the same room with a woman sitting on the side of the bed, leaning over a young boy with black hair and the same striking blue eyes as the king. As she sang, the boy’s lids grew heavy until he was sleeping quietly. She kissed his forehead.

At his right again, he heard the sound of heavy footsteps. He spun around to see the same boy, a little older, running into the room only to find his mother crumpled on the floor with her blood pooled around her, soaking her golden hair red. “Mother,” the boy dropped down to his knees and held her tightly, hoping that she would hold him back, but she was as cold as winter ice. Gendry remembered that.

A man stepped from the shadows, fully cloaked, and the boy lunged at him. “You killed my mother,” he screamed as he pounded his fits at the person. Hands snaked their way out of the cloak and held his wrists. “No, that was not me, but if you stay here, those that did will kill you too.”

The boy sniffled and wiped the tears from his eyes with the heels of his hands. Gendry only remembered some of this, but now he saw it in fully. He tried to see who it was that hid behind the cloak, but he couldn't see the face at any angle.

That's when he heard voices to his right, again, and saw his younger self brought before Tobho Mott by the cloaked figure. And at his right, he heard the clank of a smith’s hammer hitting metal against an anvil and Gendry saw himself shaping a helm, the bull’s helm he’d loved so dearly years ago.

Again to his right, Gendry heard the sounds of many people's voices and turned to see Winterfell, a different Winterfell.

A girl ran past him, her fine, noble gown muddied and wearing a helm. She rushed to join a line of people standing and waiting. The man, Gendry recognized as Arya's father, stopped the girl and pulled the helm from her head. Her hair was pulled back in a simple fashion and Gendry sucked in a breath.

It was Arya, very close to the age when he’d met her. He shouldn’t have been surprised, having recognized her father, Jon, and a very much alive Sansa. Arya pushed a younger boy out of her way to stand next to her sister. It was then that Gendry could see that boy beside Arya clearly and looked to his right to see the the boy standing before him in the forest. The visions spun him around and his hold on his surrounds was unsteady, but he recognized the man, now.

It was Arya’s younger brother, the only one she had left.

Slowly, the Winterfell he’d seen with Arya’s family whole melted into ruins worse than the state it had been at their arrival. There was nothing left but hollowed structures, smoke and fires. Above him, he heard a dragon screech and saw three circling, a woman with white-blond hair riding one of them.

He heard sobs from a girl and crossed the smoking rubble to follow it. It was Rellie kneeling beside a body. Arya’s body.

There were no clothes to cover her body, exposing the lashes across her back and bruises along the rest, particularly around her wrists and ankles. There was blood dried at her thighs and a gash at her throat. Her head was turned, and her eyes stared beyond. Gendry tried to tell himself that it wasn't real, but he felt the heat from the fires and smelled the smoke and death.

Rellie covered her with a cloak, Arya’s fur cloak, and Gendry dropped down to his knees and tried to pull her into his arms and hold her, but she faded around his hands like smoke.

“My sister is the only hope for Winterfell and the North. Do not fail her,” the man’s voice said to him before the forest shifted back to Winterfell’s godswood. It was such a sudden change, and Gendry was still dizzy from the visions, he lost his balance and almost fell into the pool of water. Holding his head for a moment to clear his thoughts enough to move without falling, Gendry remembered that he was to gather in the Great Hall. He rushed out of the godswood, to the Great Hall.

* * *

“No!” Gendry stood in the Great Hall opposite Arya, shoulders squared as though ready for battle. Thonas laid a hand on his shoulder that he only shrugged away, never looking away from his lady high.

“You will do as I ask, Ser Gendry!”

“No, I will not!” he answered her with just as much finality as she’d given him. He could feel the tension in the room as thick as honey but not nearly as sweet. “I won’t leave Winterfell unprotected!”

She knew well enough what he truly meant: that he would not leave her unprotected. She wanted Gendry and Thonas to take Mors, Artos, their men, and most of the hired soldiers Winterfell had accumulated to the Hornwood. It was Arya’s answer to the Lord Bolton’s call to arms: bring him to her, alive or dead before he could gather more men.

That would leave only a handful of soldiers to protect Winterfell…to protect her. She was a force to be reckoned with when she had time to plan or fight against a handful. But if Bolton’s men went through or around them… His thoughts turned to the wolves as her protection, but according to the maester, they had their own troubles. They had become prey, and Gendry was convinced the Lord Bolton had something to do with it.

And even though Nymeria was faithful to her human, of that Gendry had no doubt, the direwolf was growing heavy with pups and her wolf cousins were far more unpredictable.

And what crept into his mind and heart was the vision her brother had given him. He felt his stomach plummet thinking about it as a possible future.

Their eyes met again, neither willing to look away until Arya stormed down from the dais to stand with her toes to his. She was so small compared to him, but he knew better than to underestimate her lethality. He was proven right when he felt Needle at his throat. “Defy me again…” she warned him.

“I’ve lost some of you. I can’t lose all of you,” he said softly enough that no one could hear but her, then turned his head away from her, exposing more of his throat to her small sword.

“Would you fail me this way?” she whispered her question meant only for him.

The last words her brother spoke to him hit him hard. “Do not fail her.” He looked down to see her eyes pleading with him, pleading as though she were helpless to what had to be done.

He nodded once, and there was a hint of softness to her face before she walked away. Once more, he felt Thonas’s hand on his shoulder, and this time he didn’t shrug it away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Each comment left is like a little piece of the puzzle. Let's finish the picture together. :)_


	24. One Bastard to Another

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A big thanks to everyone who commented, kudo'd, and/or bookmarked this story.

Arya wouldn’t see him for the rest of the day, even when he was bold enough to stand at her door and have the timid voiced Rellie tell him, “My lady wishes to be alone at present.”

As the door closed in front of him, his skin prickled with rage, then confusion and a hint of despair at how distant she’d become. This was his life with Arya Stark; this was the life he chose, but he didn’t expect her to lose her like this, at least so soon. Part of him wondered if this was for the best. She would have to choose a lord husband, and wasn’t it better to work through this rejection now than later?

In his room, he rested on his featherbed with his back against the headboard and knees bent, all of the finery befitting the chamber of the castellan of Winterfell surrounding him. Pitch black velvet and gold silk canopied his bed and draped along the bedposts at Arya’s insistence. She told him that the colors suited him, but wouldn’t say why.

It wasn’t until after one of his lessons with Maester Roebin did he realize that the colors were Baratheon.

“You’re a Baratheon whether you like it or not. You may not want to be, but you will have to accept it,” Arya told him the day he confronted her about them, but he hadn't accepted it. He hadn't accepted any of it.

Thonas reveled and flourished in this new life of theirs, but it constantly chafed Gendry's arse as a reminder of his uncle and the red witch, as the source of why Arya could never truly be his. He closed his eyes and allowed sleep to take him.

 _The smoke cleared and he saw Rellie kneeling over a body, covering it with a cloak. Gendry rushed to them and saw that it was Arya. He pulled her close to him, the tears flowed freely, and he squeezed her closer to him. Her body was cold and limp, and the ground beneath him shifted until it disappeared entirely like dry sand through fingers. He held Arya tightly and allowed oblivion to take them both, but it didn’t._ He woke, his tunic and breeches sticking to his skin with sweat.

The walls that were heavily decorated with the finest tapestries the Lannister coin could buy stifled the air in the room, and its grand size didn't seem so grand but felt smaller than a rented one-room shack in Flea Bottom. He couldn’t breathe, and his body broke into a sweat. He had to leave, to get out of his room and the Keep. He glanced to his side to see there was no longer daylight outside his window, and realized that there was something that could distract him.. He grabbed his light cloak and left, heading towards the smithy.

Master Mott was already preparing for the next session: tools set out, the mass of metal that once was two swords set aside.

“I wasn’t sure you would come. There’ve been talk that you will leave for the east on the morrow.”

Gendry didn’t answer at first. He simply added more wood to the forge fire until it was so hot that he could barely stand at arms length from it. Even that wasn’t enough heat to forge the Valyrian steel, but it was a start. When Master Mott stood his ground with his eyes hard on Gendry and his arms folded, Gendry realized that he would have to say something.

“I would like to finish the blade before I leave.” he tells Master Mott, and the older man nods before taking the mass of Valyrian steel and handing it to Gendry.

* * *

Thonas and Mors were deep in conversation by the time Gendry stepped outside of the Keep and toward the men and horses gathered. The armor he wore were bought from Cerwyn's armorer, and Gendry swore to himself that he would make his own as it chafed at his joints and especially when he slipped the helm atop his head before climbing his horse.

He missed his bull helm and the subtle changes he’d made to it to fit comfortably.

The men, now all mounted, turned and marched out of the gates of Winterfell to join the soldiers awaiting them outside. He felt her eyes on him, and when he turned his head to the doors of the Keep, his eyes met Arya’s as she pulled the fur cloak tighter.

They did not ride hard, but the kept a steady, brisk pace toward the Hornwood, the last seen location of Lord Bolton. For the most part, Gendry could brood in peace as their journey was surprisingly uneventful.

By the time they’d made their first camp, Mors sat beside him at one of the campfires, Thonas at his other side. The man took some time to settle, age taking its toll on weary bones. “The look of you. I knew I’ve seen it before, but it wasn’t until I saw the look in your eye with that wooden warhammer in your hand.”

Gendry didn’t bother to look the older man’s way, continuing to stare into the fire.

“You’re the bastard Stannis had held in Dragonstone.”

If not for the other thoughts that had taken hold of his mind, Gendry might have flinched at the reminder. Instead, he nodded once, continuing to stare at a particular errant flame in the campfire.

Mors leaned back and rested on his elbows. “I never much cared for that Baratheon, but Ned Stark supported his claim to the throne before Ned died. Stannis believed himself the rightful king that he was willing to do anything for it.”

That was something Gendry knew personally.

“Sometimes, I wonder if Seleyse Baratheon truly flung herself from the cliffs of Dragonstone so that her lord husband could marry the queen, or did he nudge her over.” The man shook his head clear as though he were lost in his own thoughts, then eyed Gendry intently. “Ned Stark would have agreed with Lady’s Stark’s choice of castellan, though. Of that I am sure.” Mors reclined fully on the ground. The man was asleep in moments, his snores joining the chorus of other men snoring in the camp. The only sounds that could be heard were of those keeping watch over the camp.

It took them three days to make it to the lands of the Hornwood, and found themselves in battle at its gates. Men loyal to the Lord of the Dreadfort fought hard, but there weren’t many of them to stop their march onward to the Keep. It was less effort than Gendry, Thonas, Mors or Artos had expected, and it gave Gendry an uneasy feeling.

The doors to the Keep parted, and Lord Bolton himself stepped out of them and down the single step. “Welcome,” he greeted Gendry and the rest of the men with arms wide and his smile broad as though greeting expected and welcomed friends.

“Something isn’t right here. It was too easy,” Thonas muttered to Gendry, mirroring his own feelings about the small band of soldiers at the gate and the almost giddy lord. All the same, Gendry gave his friend a nod in the Lord Bolton’s direction, signaling for the man to bind the lord. Bolton accepted his binds without complaint.

“Tell me Castellan, does the lady wolf howl when you fuck her?” the Lord Bolton said as Thonas roughly bound him with hemp. Gendry tried to ignore the man’s words, but his fists clenched and his pulsed pounded at his temples. His eyes swept over the faces around him, and he saw no surprised in most at the accusation, except for when he stopped at Artos Flint. The man paled, all blood had drained from his face as he stared at Gendry with new eyes.

“I’m itching to hear for myself,” the lord finished and that was the end of Gendry patience. He crossed the distance between them in a heartbeat and struck the man’s face with his armored fist. The lord sank down to the ground held only by the binds in Thonas’s hand. Even then, the lord laughed after he spat blood on the ground, his mouth covered in it.

“Yes, Castellan. The whispers have reached far and wide of how the lady wolf spreads her legs for a bastard born knight. It stands to reason that she will more than willingly spread them for a bastard born lord.”

Gendry struck him again, just under his left eye and the man sank down again. This time Gendry didn’t settle for the one blow. He grabbed the lord by his collar and repeatedly struck him in whatever area of the face he could reach. Thonas couldn’t hold the bindings any longer from the shear force of Gendry against the man; the man was soon on the ground, held only by Gendry.

It took several men to pull him back, and he strained against them holding him away from the bloodied lord on the ground. The lord began to laugh again. “How is your lady, Castellan? Comfortable in her wolf den or are there hunters surrounding her as we speak?”

Bolton's words pried the visions through the fog of his rage, and he saw Arya, dead in what was left of Winterfell, the vision her brother had given him. He held his head, trying to push the vision out but it wouldn’t leave. The smug grin on the pummeled face of Lord Bolton caused a chill to run down his spine, and in that moment, he knew.

“Gather the men, mount your horses! We have to return to Winterfell!” he commanded with all the authority of a true leader, and without question, the men did as they were told.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _A comment a day keeps the writer's block away!_


	25. All Laid Bare

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A big thanks to everyone who commented, kudo'd, and/or bookmarked this story.

He ran them hard until the horses could not go on, and they were forced to stop long enough to rest both men and horses.

Gendry sat opposite the Lord Bolton and watched the man, seething that the lunatic could find the exact words to sour his gut and force his rage to bubble to the surface. Thonas had laughed that it wasn't that difficult a task.

With equal intensity, the Lord Bolton watched Gendry with a smug grin. His eyes were wide and feral and lacked any semblance kindness. There were rumors of what he would do for sport, and even as they stared, Gendry wondered if any of it was what the man planned for Arya.

The respite from their hard riding lasted no more than the time it took to drink their water and stretch their weary muscles before Gendry had them riding on the road once more until the sun had set fully and it was too dark to see. And still, Gendry wanted to continue onward. It was Thonas who had to talk to him, coax him to reason. “The men need rest. How well would they fight if they have not slept in days?”

Gendry conceded, but he didn’t sleep. All night, he watch the man carefully, the lord of the Dreadfort and the thorn in the North's arse.

It was a half-day’s hard ride after that when they were attacked, men loyal to the Dreadfort and Lord Bolton, but when they were attacked again and again by small bands of soldiers, Gendry's heart sank.

“They’re distractions to delay us from Winterfell,” he said to Thonas, Mors, and Artos over the bodies that had fallen in their latest skirmish.

Mors nodded. “Small bands of soldiers, a pittance of the strength Ramsay Bolton has accumulated.”

It was the morn of the following day before they made it to Winterfell, and in the distance they could see many thatched roofs were set ablaze and adding to the chaos was the scattering of people running and fighting and dying. As they neared, the sight unfolding before them left the men speechless.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so I'm not sure how you guys feel about all of this, so let me explain myself a little bit in how I came up with this. My impression of Lyanna Stark is that she didn't seem naive or stupid to the ways of her world. She even understood completely what Robert was like.
> 
> So to me, that meant that she knew fully what could happen if she chose to run away with Rhaegar. Under those circumstances and her personality, it seems to me that she would allow herself an affair with Rhaegar, drink moon tea and become Robert's wife. The only problem in that plan would be if the moon tea didn't work. And why wouldn't the moon tea work? Well, that's another of my theories that I won't get into during this story.
> 
> I didn't think I would have to explain this more than what's there, but after this chapter, I think I should give a little more info on the teas. According to the descriptions of moon tea in the books, it's an abortifacient which means that it terminates a pregnancy or a possible pregnancy. Arya's tea is a contraceptive. I just thought this would be more plausible and practical for female assassins.
> 
> I'm going to go run and hide now.
> 
>  
> 
> _Comments are how you pay a fanfic author. Feedback is worth its weight in gold._


	26. Gift of Many Faces

From the window, there were sounds of birds chirping and people moving about, and he opened his eyes to see bright sunlight streaming through it. It was a day that would have been considered fine if not for the dread that surfaced along with his thoughts from the fog of sleep.

Queen Daenerys’s proclamations…Arya with child…he was still in her chambers…

He quickly rolled over to find Arya staring at him with a smile across her face. “You look like shit.”

His first reaction was to laugh, and a chuckle managed to slip through before he stifled it. He didn’t want to laugh. She was to die, and there was nothing left for him to laugh for.

Seeing his thoughts on his face caused her smile to fade. “You have your uncle's face." Her lips twisted into a sneer. "You will stop this, now!”

Gendry lifted his head but couldn't bring his eyes to meet hers. He couldn’t find the strength to do it, and she didn’t wait for him to do it. She took hold of his chin so that he came to her face and willed his eyes to hers.

“I’m trying to—” he started feebly, but she sneered at him and growled out, “Horse shit!”


	27. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did you once enjoy reading this fic or have you started reading it and wish the whole story was available? Well, because someone has stolen my work (as well as the work of many others) to post on their site, I have removed all instances of the full version of this story, everywhere. This person has made steps to evade law and ignore the few rights we fanfic authors have in the name of "preserving" the fics they stole. Guess what? I'm not sure they're aware of it or not, but they have a limited version. The full version of this fic is now no longer available because of them. Wish you could read the whole thing? I wish that, too. Thank them for all of this (nadie4ever.go@gmail.com).

The clank of the hammer hitting steel was soothing to her, making her feel more at home than the Keep ever could. Her father was in the smithy, in his element, and she quietly stepped through the door and sat on one of the barrels in a corner.

He didn’t have to look back to know she was there. “You shouldn’t be here,” he said to her before hitting the metal one more time. “You should run off and be a Stark, the frost hardy wildlings that you are.”

His words hurt her more than he knew. “But Father,” she sighed and folded her arms, “My swordplay is nothing like Alyanna’s, nor do I prefer to run in the Wolfswood with the direwolves. And Septa Nerine wants me to embroider. I don’t want to embroider.”

“Then what do you want to do, Sansanaea?” he asked before shoving the metal into a barrel of water until the sizzling died into a hiss, and the hiss faded completely. There was no snapping sound, so her father didn’t use the indecent words he often chose when that happened.

“I’m afraid I may have no place here,” she finally admitted to her father.

Gendry turned and wiped the soot from his hands onto his apron as he approached her. She couldn’t meet his eyes, couldn’t face the shame that she was not as wild as her older sister, and nowhere near as boisterous as her little brother. She was Sansanaea, the quiet little lady of Winterfell.

Gently, her father curled his finger under her chin to lift it. “You’ll be what you must when you must,” he said to her before offering a smile. This is why she loved her time with her father. He understood her in a way her mother, sister and brother couldn’t.

“Faaaather!” a voice extended the word from outside the smithy, coming closer until Sansanaea’s little brother, Eddard, rushed inside with his cheeks flushed from exertion. The boy had only recently seen his fifth Name Day and he was already taller than the others his age, but that wasn’t an issue as their father picked him up with one arm and flipped the boy onto his shoulder when the boy rushed by, propelled by his own momentum.


	28. **Not a Chapter**

Did you once enjoy reading this fic or have you started reading it and wish the whole story was available? Well, because someone has stolen my work (as well as the work of many others) to post on their site, I have removed all instances of the full version of this story, everywhere. This person has made steps to evade law and ignore the few rights we fanfic authors have in the name of "preserving" the fics they stole. Guess what? I'm not sure they're aware of it or not, but they have a limited version. The full version of this fic is now no longer available because of them. Wish you could read the whole thing? I wish that, too. Thank them for all of this (nadie4ever.go@gmail.com).


End file.
